An occasional trip to a country hotel with little planned other than a bath and dinner was just what the doctor ordered. But Blighty’s luxury hotels offer a wide range of workshops and courses that are worth knowing about. Many tap into your inner creativity, giving you the luxury of focusing solely on the task at hand, and almost all are set in gentle, inspiring countryside or landscaped gardens, helping to clear the city soot from your lungs.
There’s also estate-to-plate food, spas, and sumptuous bedrooms where you can relax after days of oil painting lemon trees or collecting herbs from gardens and studying their healing powers with a medical herbalist. Less skill, more creative soul food, here are the best hotel retreats in the UK you can book now.
Painting Retreat with Arniano, Amber Guinness and William Roper-Curzon at Lime Wood, The New Forest
The healing benefits of painting are well documented, and the Arniano School of Painting’s new two-day Lime Wood retreat offers plenty of material to study. The charismatic William Roper-Curzon will take both budding and seasoned artists through the strokes and movements of capturing Lime Wood’s best botanical angles, with expert tips and plenty of Pink Winks, easel-side cocktails along the way.
Lime Wood’s idyllic countryside and sun-drenched gardens truly make this course its own; not only for painting, but also for al fresco lunches. Collaborating with HH&Co’s Luke Holder, Amber Guinness will cook up an Italian storm using local ingredients and recipes inspired by the book ‘A House Party in Tuscany’ to feed hungry performers. Guests can also enjoy a nice aperitif on the terrace and look forward to cozy candlelit dinners with good candlelight conversations. This retreat also includes a rebalancing spa treatment at Lime Wood’s award-winning Herb House and two nights of deep sleep on the rooms’ heavenly beds, where you’ll wake up to the gentle chirping of birds outside.
Detail: Two-night retreat, 8-10 July from £1,565 per person (based on double occupancy) including painting lessons and all food and drink. limewoodhotel.co.uk
Weed Medicine Heroes Workshop in Beaverbrook, Surrey
Have you heard the tales of nettle soup? A one-day herbicide workshop led by Beaverbrook’s Medicinal Herbalist and author Jo Dunbar will surprise guests accustomed to luring these alleged gardening rabble-rousers out of flower beds and walkways and into the compost. Jo will educate the group on the healing powers of UK garden weeds such as elderberry and nettle, as well as wilder hedge herbs such as ribwort. By highlighting their healing properties, Jo hopes to change views on weeds and show how some of the most powerful herbs are hiding in plain sight. The workshop concludes with dinner at the Delicatessen, where like-minded individuals attending the course can share their thoughts over magnificent slices of stone-baked pizza. There’s also the opportunity to enjoy a boil at Beaverbrook’s expansive, light-filled Coach House Spa.
Detail: Multiple appointments at Beaverbrook start from £195. beaverbrook.co.uk
Floristry and cookery workshops in Thyme, Cotswolds
This idyllic, village-like hotel in the Cotswolds will welcome you as you set off. The air is sweeter, the buildings are more beautiful, and what grows in the soil here influences almost everything, from the seasonal menus at Oxbarn to the botanical wallpapers in the farmhouse rooms, originally illustrated and painted by Caryn Hibbert. The spa even pulls herbs from the garden and rubs them with oils on tired muscles. Thyme’s cooking, floristry and wellness workshops all round out the stay, especially as none of them feel overly demanding, giving you something to look forward to when you’re not drinking cocktails at Baa Bar or swimming in the walled garden pool. Highlights include a seasonal center workshop where Thyme’s house florist leads a group across the grounds to the cutting garden, then returns to the kitchen to guide budding florists through a showy bouquet; and jam and sorbet classes, where beginners are shown recipes using seasonal ingredients like gooseberry jam, vanilla marmalade or meadowsweet sorbet in just two hours.
Detail: Dates and duration vary by workshop or course. thyme.co.uk
Pottery Workshop with Martha Freud at the Ham Yard Hotel
Martha Freud will bring her distinctive style of irreverent ceramics to the Ham Yard Hotel this April for a creative one-day workshop. During a day of making, mingling and feasting, Martha will walk the group through the artistic process of creating their own personalized ceramic pots from clay. Guests will be treated to a delicious lunch at the Ham Yard Restaurant, whose walls are adorned with Martha’s illuminated ceramic pots. After the session the pottery will be fired and glazed so it can be taken home or delivered to your home for you to treasure.
Detail: Saturday 27 April, 10am-3pm, Ham Yard Hotel, £350 per person including all ingredients, morning coffee, lunch and take-home ceramic pot. FirmadaleHotels.com
Courage and Grace Day Resilience Retreat at Bingham Riverhouse, Richmond
For those living in more central locations, staying in Richmond is like a real holiday. They feel worlds away from the urban jungle, with their riverside antics, gambling and Pimms’ energy, beautiful homes and people who generally seem happy to be alive. Bingham Riverhouse is the new place to visit in the area, especially for its well-curated program of diverse workshops, talks and courses.
The endurance course really appeals to busy Londoners, with World Record Holder, Ted-X Speaker, explorer and athlete Vicki Anstey revealing her tips on a day retreat. Alongside holistic practitioner and entrepreneur Sama Trinder and Bingham Riverhouse owner Vicki, the group is equipped with the essential skills and tools needed to build resilience and test the concept at Contra Spa. This is the UK’s first hot and cold spa to feature immunity-boosting, fatigue-busting contrast therapy. Along with a nutritious lunch overlooking the water at the Riverhouse restaurant, guests can look forward to Somatic movements, stretches and meditation led by Sama to restore a sense of inner calm.
Detail: Sunday 12 May at Bingham Riverhouse, Richmond, £150 per person. binghamriverhouse.com
Cooking lessons in Daylesford
With its worldly luxury features and linen-on-linen aesthetic, Daylesford is a surefire place to tap into your inner craftsman. Daylesford Farm includes accommodation in one of the tastefully dressed cottages and repurposed pubs scattered throughout Kingham and Daylesford Village, with access to the prestigious Daylesford Cookery School. Whether it’s an afternoon of ‘quick and simple dinners’ or bread-making and pasta masterclasses, it’s run by engaging, passionate chefs who draw on Daleysford’s organic bounty and make every level of developing their culinary skills fun.
Detail: Daylesford pubs start from £160 per night. Daylesford Cottages start from £375 per night. daylesford.com
Al Fresco Supper Club with Ana Ortiz at Boys Hall, Kent
Brad Lomas, owner of Boys Hall, the redesigned Jacobean school in Kent, has a thing for wine, especially English wine. Lucky for him, his hotel can be found on South East England’s viticultural ticket, where he curates a cellar of more than 4,000 bottles. His guests are lucky that he is willing to share his passion (and open his cellar) with a series of wine events throughout the year. Of these, Ana Ortiz’s (Brad’s wife) outdoor supper club stands out. Up to 40 people can look forward to a fiery feast at banquet-style tables in the garden, paired with some of Kent’s finest wines, which Brad will take to his guests. The couple know a thing or two about outdoor cooking; their kitchen is best known for its asado-style grilling, so look forward to a vibrant, delicious afternoon of perfectly cooked meats and a collaboration between Firemade UK and Wine Garden of England. .
Detail: 20 June, £160. Boys-Hall.com
Longevity Retreat in the Lakes by Deepak Chopra YOO
The Cotswolds’ chichi lake retreat (more Como than muddy countryside) is making a splash in the workshop section this summer, with Deepak Chopra stepping in to provide holistic healing. World-renowned integrative medicine pioneer and Clinical Professor of Family Medicine and Public Health is an authority on personal transformation. Those lucky enough to get a place on this three-day course can enjoy deeply designed one-to-one sessions with the wellness chef, as well as a host of holistic experiences that take place by the water and make the most of the fresh country air. . This is the quintessential mind and body health retreat, so sign up early to avoid disappointment.
Detail: June 13-16 at Lakes YOO, price TBC. thelakesbyyoo.com
Botanical Linoprint Weekend Workshop at The Cavendish, Chatsworth
Situated in one of the Peak District’s most beautiful villages and forming part of the extensive Chatsworth Estate, The Cavendish has the cozy, traditional character of a pub with rooms. This is the ultimate weekend break in the countryside without going too far into the sticks.
This summer the hotel will host a botanical linoprinting weekend workshop where guests can tap into their inner creativity through etching and printing plates, use flowers from the Chatsworth cutting garden as inspiration and share anecdotes of the day over a hearty lunch. Under expert guidance, they will learn the basic principles of botanical linocut printing (drawing, design principles, linocut preparation and various printing methods) and will be able to compile their own accordion design books by exchanging prints with other artists. There’s also the privilege of wandering through one of the UK’s most seductive mansions, basking in the fresh Peak District Air and channeling the Duchess of Devonshire on a balmy July afternoon.
Detail: 20-21 July at The Cavendish, £185 per person including garden entry and lunch. visitpeakdistrict.com
Assembled Cocktail Making Workshop in Heckfield Place, Hampshire
Known for its opulent yet simple interiors, attractive art collection and beautiful countryside, Heckfield Place welcomes newcomers, especially those accustomed to traveling further from London for this style of home-away-from-home countryside accommodation. The hotel has built a pretty good reputation in the food department, with Sky Glyngall’s Hearth restaurant serving as a masterclass in radical seasonal, simple but sumptuous cooking, and the cocktails here aren’t bad at all either, especially with wild-picked herbs. forest floor. This is exactly how the Collector Cocktail Making Workshop begins; guests pick through the wood like truffle pigs in search of herbs, plants and flowers that can be used in cocktails. Then they head back to base, where Heckfeld Place’s knowledgeable bar staff will teach them what to do with the treasures they’ve collected and whether they’ll also work for homemade liqueurs and tinctures.
Detail: Multiple dates from April to November. heckfieldplace.com