Surrey Homes | SH101 | June 2023 | Education Supplement inside

Previous pages & above: The sitting room is at the front of the house, with a large window looking out onto the cobbled street. The walls are painted
in Stone III from Paint & Paper Library, and the velvet sofa is from Sofa Workshop. A large illustrated map of Rye is by artist Richard Adams
Rye Citadel, sitting up on the
hill above Romney Marsh,
is a medieval high point in
a sheep-speckled landscape that was
once on the sea bed. Its place as an
important trading point and defensive
stronghold has slipped into history,
but this beautiful old town remains
an iconic place, whether you are on a
pilgrimage to see some seafaring history,
maybe visit Henry James’s (National
Trust) house, or walk where the famous
fictional creations of E F Benson’s
Mapp and Lucia are said to have
roamed (their home town of Tilling
is widely known to be based on Rye).
If you just want a quiet getaway in a
picturesque seaside retreat, you can’t do
much better than this historic town.
Climbing up Mermaid Street (so
named, let’s hope, because a shoal of
mermaids once lived there) and into
the heart of the Citadel, we are swept
back to ancient days; many of the
houses are medieval, or Tudor, listed
and preserved in their entirety. To
add to the time traveller atmosphere
no car parking is allowed on the
cobbled streets. A daily curfew is in
place for deliveries – and as we
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