Firstly, can I just say a big hello and thank you very much for reading! As this is my first ever blog post I thought it would be a good idea to introduce you to our family and tell you a little bit about ourselves.
We are the Riley Family and own Conkers’ Cottage! We are lucky enough to live on our own working farm at Upper Stanway where the holiday let is situated.
Our farm is largely arable based, although we also run a cattle business alongside. We recently specialised in rearing English Longhorn Cross Cattle, a really lovely breed. They were originally used as a draught animal as well as for producing excellent butter and milk. We also rent out some of the ground to a neighbouring farmer for his sheep, so you may well see these grazing in the parks alongside the farm drive if you come to stay.
The Riley Family has been farming since 1900. Back in 1972, David Riley (my father-in-law) made the brave decision to sell the family farm. It was run predominately as a dairy farm back then. He married Vivienne Riley and together they bought another farm in Warwickshire before eventually buying Stanway in October 1978. The farm has gone from strength to strength since then.
One of the first things David and Vivienne did was to make use of the empty buildings and houses on the estate. The privately-owned barns in the courtyard by the farm house were all converted by David and Vivienne. Indeed, many of the properties you see on the Stanway Estate all once belonged to the farm itself, including the Lodge at the top of the drive and the Manor House half way along.
David also built several more sheds to house grain and stock animals.
Vivienne working alongside David on the farm also set up a fabric business with a friend who lived at the Manor House at the time, “Stanway Fabrics.” The shop specialised in selling excellent quality fabric seconds. They had a number of influential clients who they used to furnish houses for.
David and Vivienne had two sons Stephen and Edward. Stephen works in the agricultural industry as a grain trader and Edward now runs the farm business alongside his father David. In recent years the partnership has bought more land near Bridgnorth as well as put up even more farm sheds and increasing the cattle numbers! A green burial site is also situated on the farm, running since 2003. This was largely run by Vivienne and makes use of woodland that needed some regeneration.
Edward married myself (Ruth) back in 2015. I am a physiotherapist by trade but last year made the decision to help run the farm. I am responsible for all the farm book keeping as well as running the green burial site and holiday let alongside my husband, it really is a team effort. Did I also mention we have three children, Florence, Clemmie and Freddie (all under 5)! Life is very very busy. We never get bored.
Sadly, we lost Vivienne at the start of this year but her legacy still lives on and can be seen by the choice of beautiful furnishings in the holiday let itself.
I can’t finish this post off without mentioning another part of our family! The dogs. We have two house dogs, Fizz and Patsy, alongside a number of other working dogs. You can see them both on the photo. Patsy (the light yellow) is extremely greedy and very rotund. She eats anything from full boxes of aspirin to loaves of bread! You need eyes in the back of your head. She once ate an entire joint of roast lamb intended for Easter, in fact she was so bad Vivienne put notices all around the farm house – BEWARE OF THE YELLOW DOG! Fizz on the other hand is our newest addition. She is very gentle natured and our children adore her. We have always had dogs here on the farm and they are a key part of our family life.
I think that’s a brief summary of us and our farm life. Hope it has given you a good idea of what we are all about, always looking for ways to move forward, hard-working and a bit mad!
We hope you’ll come and stay at Conkers’ Cottage soon. Check the Contact page for availability and contact details.
