Winters Tale Country Barn

The secret garden is the thing to ask about at Winters Tale, out in the Buckinghamshire countryside. You get to it through a brick archway, and once you’re inside it’s enclosed, quiet and small enough that the two of you fill the frame, which is a completely different picture from the wide open stuff everywhere else here. There’s a pergola and a wrought-iron arch in there as well, with rose borders on the way in. Two minutes past the buildings the fields start: a country lane that works well under a dramatic sky, a winding path, long meadow grass. The venue’s own field takes a big guest list in one row without anybody being shuffled about. The old house on the grounds has stone pillars and climbing ivy, and there’s an ivy-framed black doorway that gives portraits an almost storybook look. You marry under a birch and flower arch, and the barn behind it carries enough window to stay bright right through the wedding breakfast before the fairy lights take over.