Shortly after I jumped into Fritton Lake — with such elliptical inelegance that the resident grebes probably felt like migrating in disgust — I wondered if anywhere else really mattered. The emails, the Zooms, the WhatsApps. Couldn’t I just stay within sight of Fritton’s weeping willows, paddling round the reservoir in a kayak, working on my backhand on the grass tennis courts and running up a large but worthwhile bar bill?
That is the attraction of this part-hotel, part-members’ club in East Anglia. It is a self-contained mishmash of nature and leisure. Even though the A143 to Great Yarmouth hums in the background, you can slip into aspirational eco-living.
Fritton Lake itself was dug out for peat in medieval times. At two miles end to end, it is sufficiently long, winding and forested that, if you squint, you can imagine you’re boating across a temperate version of the Amazon. The adjoining facilities include the Clubhouse (a small pub-lodging formerly known as the humble Fritton Arms), two self-catering cottages and 100 cabins in woodland or meadows. All the cabins are privately owned but 30 of the owners rent their properties out to all-comers when not visiting themselves. There is space for 30 more, available to buy off-plan.
Although Soho Farmhouse is a reference point, Fritton does not have an overly luxurious vibe. It is helping to fund a wider transformation of the 5,000-acre Somerleyton estate. The current Lord Somerleyton, Hugh Crossley, has committed to giving one-fifth of the land to conservation (aka rewilding) and adopting environmentally friendly (aka regenerative) agriculture on much of the rest.
He has been asking other landowners in the region to devote 20 per cent of their own land, under the umbrella name WildEast. That would total 250,000 acres of East Anglia for nature. “I don’t think it’s going to happen any time soon,” he admits — but more than 20,000 acres have been committed. Crossley is currently focused on encouraging farmers to fatten out hedgerows into “wild edges”, 10 metres wide.
In rural England, great visions attract great scepticism, especially when they use the word “wild”. Not all of Somerleyton’s neighbours like the estate’s turn to nature. Some farmers feel threatened by anything that questions the primacy of producing the most food possible. Crossley’s talk of addressing his “debt to nature” is bound to wind them up the wrong way. But it is his land and his desire for change is justified.
Britain needs to devote less land to livestock and more to nature. Some people counter that some of the land can only be used for grazing animals, but even that doesn’t explain why, according to the WWF, 40 per cent of our most productive agricultural land is also used to grow feed for them. Taking marginal lands out of production and restoring plant and animal species is the only way to go. Somerleyton’s 1,000 acres of conservation include 450 of former farmland.
Wheat, yellow peas, oilseed rape and other crops remain. Crossley has actually increased the number of sheep on the farm, to more than 300 ewes, by allowing them to graze the cover crops — the uncommercial plants grown to keep the soil covered in the periods between crops. He is working out how many pigs and cows can be justified on ecological grounds. For example, the 300-acre park surrounding Somerleyton Hall — his marvellous 19th-century pile that has featured in The Crown — now has only 20 Welsh Black cattle. The cows graze there over the winter, unlike the previous set-up, where the land was sprayed with fertilisers to produce silage for a larger herd. So the park has taken on a more shaggy, rugged look — which, Crossley insists, is more faithful to the original aesthetic.
Elsewhere there are Exmoor ponies and five Asian water buffalo, who churn up the ground and stare down their noses at prying visitors. Pigs are charged with tearing up the bracken. In Somerleyton Hall’s entrance, there are two stuffed polar bears, shot by Crossley’s great-grandfather in 1897. If the landed class now appreciates animals alive rather than dead, that seems like progress. Visitors to Fritton are encouraged to go on foraging and rewilding tours.
Crossley was initially inspired by the Knepp Castle estate in Sussex, but regenerative farming means different things on the sandy soils in East Anglia. Brambles are spreading slowly over the released land. “It will take a lot longer here because we get 10 inches less rainfall and we’re on sand,” says Crossley. He aspires to have Dalmatian pelicans and beavers (authorities have so far refused permission for the latter). White storks are being kept in captivity by the hall, with the hope that they will breed chicks that can be released.
Even with a vision like Crossley’s, compromises are inevitable. He initially ended pheasant shoots, but restarted them on a smaller scale to allow the tradition to continue. Ripping out planted firs would probably be advisable on conservation grounds, but he can’t justify the cost. Driving around the estate in an old military vehicle, we check on a trial of no-till potatoes (the conventional way of harvesting potatoes is terrible for the soil). The no-till crop is almost laughably small. Maybe there is no way to grow cheap potatoes without damaging the soil.
Visitors to Fritton need not worry about all this. There is a sauna overlooking the lake, a swimming pool, two large children’s play areas and a biophilic gym (that is, the treadmill is part-made of oak). The newer cabins, prefabricated by a company called Koto with Scandinavian and Japanese inspiration, have two bedrooms, a small kitchen, a decent-sized living room and outdoor decking, complete with wood-fired hot tub. Owners won’t have that much privacy, especially while the trees separating the lots are saplings. The idea is presumably that the club community is part of the selling point. More decisively, the cabins are country pads with the lowest possible maintenance.
After a couple of nights at Fritton, I face the obvious reality that my cabin is not big enough to live in full-time. Like most people, I will never be able to give up all the Zoom calls anyway. But for a few days or weeks at a time, Fritton does offer a much better, much greener background.
Details
Henry Mance was a guest of Fritton Lake (frittonlake.co.uk). Cabins sleeping four cost from £468 for three nights or from £803 in a Koto cabin; double rooms at the Clubhouse cost from £180 per night
Find out about our latest stories first — follow @ftweekend on Twitter