The Cowshed | Enjoy a romantic break in Chesire at this uniquely designed hot tub barn

There’s a barn near Nantwich that somebody has turned into something quite unique. Unique in the sense that it used to house cows and now houses a hidden bath by a real fire, a mezzanine bedroom, a second bath tucked under the stars outside, leather sofas, surround sound, and furniture made from things that used to be other things entirely. The 1940s trunk doing duty as a coffee table is a detail that tells you everything about how The Cowshed approaches the business of a Cheshire romantic break. Winner of Best Accommodation in Cheshire 2026 and nominated by Muddy Cheshire Awards as a finalist in the Top 10 most romantic places to stay.

The barn sits half a mile outside the village of Wrenbury, in the kind of rolling Cheshire countryside that makes the drive from the motorway feel like it happened to someone else. It sleeps four across two king-size bedrooms — a ground floor room and a mezzanine that looks down over the open-plan living area below, which is the sort of view that makes lying in bed on a Saturday morning a genuinely excellent decision. Almost everything inside has been upcycled, recycled or re-imagined, and the overall effect is less “rustic barn conversion” and more “someone with very good taste went slightly mad with a vision.” It works.

The Cowshed has two baths, which requires some explanation. The first is indoors, hidden in the seating of the ground floor bedroom, positioned in direct line of sight of the log burner and the television. A bubble bath by a real fire with something on the TV is, it turns out, a strong enough reason to book a romantic break in Cheshire on its own. The second bath is outside, hidden under the covered seating area in the partially glass-roofed terrace that catches the evening sun just right. It is a double-ended bath. It is designed for two people and stargazing in roughly equal measure. Between the two of them, they account for a significant proportion of the time most guests spend at The Cowshed, which is exactly as it should be.

One well-behaved dog is welcome, which the Cheshire countryside immediately outside the door will appreciate. The Bickerton Hills and the Sandstone Trail are a short drive away; the barn itself sits on a designated Cheshire cycle route; and Cheshire Farm Ice Cream — the largest ice cream parlour in Europe, ten minutes away, fifty-plus flavours including multiple gold award winners — is either a highlight or an afterthought depending on your priorities, but is worth knowing about either way.

When hunger calls for something more serious, The Cowshed is positioned between two of Cheshire’s finest gastro pubs. The Cholmondeley Arms is three miles in one direction — over 500 gins, open fires, food serious enough to have earned a Telegraph endorsement as best rural pub in Britain, and the sort of place the taxi decision makes itself. Docket 33 in Whitchurch sits in the other direction, with a tasting menu and wine pairings to match every course. Neither requires advance planning. Both require a night off driving.

Wrenbury station runs a scenic service to Shrewsbury — cobbled streets, timbered buildings, a Michelin-listed restaurant, an ancient independent cinema — and onward to Ludlow, which has built an entire reputation on fine food and antiques and entirely deserves it. Chester is twenty minutes by car. Manchester and Liverpool each around forty. Cholmondeley Castle Gardens are practically on the doorstep. The Cowshed is the kind of place that works whether you arrive with a full itinerary or no plan whatsoever — though in practice, two baths and a log burner have a way of settling that question fairly quickly.

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