HENGRAVE is one of the prizes of early Tudor architecture, a house that is “in all the books”. It is as ravishing as a small Oxford college, with an arched gateway leading into a handsome stone-faced quadrangle, a great hall and a chapel filled with exquisite stained glass, all set in a broad expanse of pretty Suffolk countryside. For £4 million you get not only a small village of attractive outbuildings but a house that has evidently been well looked after, with not a cobweb to be seen in its hundred-odd rooms. There is a monastic simplicity to the whole place, reflecting the fact that for half a century its occupants have been the Sisters of the Assumption, who ran the house first as a girls’ school, then as a retreat. Now there is the chance that it can be a grand house once more.

Remarkably, the building accounts for Hengrave survive. In 1525 Sir John Kytson, a rich cloth merchant, contracted with John Eastawe to “make a house of all manor of mason’s worck and bricklaying” according to a “frame” (evidently an early architectural plan). This was the contract for the carcass of the house. It was followed by another with Thomas Neker for “seelyng” Hengrave, a reference to fitting out the interior.

The oriel window over the entrance was commissioned separately from John Sparke. This is dated 1538, and is a series of billowing curves as richly treated as the windows of Henry VII’s chapel at Westminster Abbey. It bursts exuberantly from the wall, Gothic above with fishscale crowns, while below are shields with the Kytson trout supported by pairs of Italian putti, two in Roman armour.

As you pause to admire the long, southfacing entrance front, the whole vocabulary of Tudor architecture is on display: octagonal turrets bristling with crockets, battlements, gables and hood moulds to the windows. It takes a few moments to see that the front is not quite symmetrical: it lacks a tall bay window on the right to match the chapel window on the left. In 18th-century engravings it is there, but it disappeared in remodelling in the 1770s. This was the work of the Gage family, to whom Hengrave passed in the 17th century. Another surprise is that only the “trim” is in stone. The rest is in brick. This is not the usual warm Tudor red brick but pale oatmeal Suffolk brick. By contrast the numerous delicious barley-sugar chimneys are red brick.

As the sun was out I asked to walk round the outside first. Anticipation had already been heightened by the long park wall, the impressive pair of gazebo lodges and lake inside the entrance, the grand expanse of park and the noble avenue aligned on the entrance front. Now, walking round to the east front, there was another surprise: the enchanting former parish church, built in flint and complete with Saxon round tower, acquired by the nuns and now an adjunct to the house. Inside are family tombs of breathtaking quality set in columned tabernacles.

Projecting from this front is a gabled wing and a modern addition by the nuns. At the back of the house is an attractive 1890s pavilion and a vast walled garden. Stretching out from the west front is a Victorian sunken garden with fountain and several matching flights of stone steps, as well as an amusing half-timbered garden pavilion with herringbone brickwork.

Entering through the Tudor arch, it is immediately obvious Hengrave is built to a regular plan with lofty passages looking out over the courtyard on both floors. It is impossible to resist stepping into this courtyard immediately to admire the perfect harmony of stone walls and stone paving, with grand oriel window to the hall complete with heraldic beasts. The masonry details are exquisite, a continuous band of quatrefoils, shallow arches to all the windows and intriguing boxed out windows on the first floor as well as an Italian wellhead in the centre.

My tour begins with the chapel (fine fan vault above the window), continuing on to the east front, with a gallery or great chamber now divided but with a lovely strapwork plaster ceiling. The great hall has a magnificent open timber roof and Victorian panelling, the work of Sir John Wood, who acquired the house in 1896. There is a minstrels’ gallery that has the inscription “Drede god and honor the King”. The rooms of the first floor are as lofty in proportion as those below, with beautiful ceilings that balloon up into the roof space in trefoil fashion. One corner room has an intriguing handkerchief vault. Many rooms are white-walled and plain, but throughout there are splendid timber doorways and doors (including some faced in leather with brass trim) and numerous handsome fireplaces. At the back there are further cosy rooms in the attics, a perfect den for children.

Hengrave comes with 46 acres; the parkland is separately owned but intact. The simplicity of the rooms means that modern furnishing could work as well as antiques. A magical transformation could be achieved with splashes of brilliantly coloured fabrics, though equally the present Shaker-like white has a beauty of its own.

The boon of Hengrave is that it does not seem to need expensive roofing works; instead your money can be spent on modern plumbing. It has the look of being well heated in winter, with no damp in evidence, thanks to constant use by the nuns for conferences and retreats.

Strutt & Parker: 020-7629 7282

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