Tour a converted oast house for sale in Kent

Photography: Hamptons

A converted Grade II-listed Oast House has gone on the market in the Kent countryside – and its cylindrical volumes make for intriguing living spaces.

The four-roundel oast house was historically used to dry hops before they were sent to the brewers. The ‘oast’ part relates specifically to the brick, charcoal-fired kilns, whose pitched roofs were designed to channel hot air through hops at the top of the chambers to dry them out.

Hayle Oast is now for sale for £2.5m via Hamptons and is located nine miles south of Tunbridge Wells, in the village of Horsmonden. The Kent property has been turned into a colossal five-bedroom home, with the old stowage (a barn-like space used for cooling and pressing the hops) reborn as an open living space with vaulted, cathedral-like ceilings and exposed honey-coloured oak beams.

The present owners oversaw the oast’s adaptive reuse and refurbishment, using swathes of glass to contrast its rustic industrial bones. Glass galleries skirt the first and second levels, with transparent floors of toughened glass maximising light-flow through the interiors.

Bedrooms have been sequestered in the roundels, with the vast barn housing communal spaces such as the lounge and kitchen, as well as a home cinema and study.

Take a tour of the 2.23-acre country property in the gallery.