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Finchingfield is a village in the Braintree district in North Essex, England, a primarily rural area. It is approximately 6 miles (10 km) from Thaxted, farther from the larger towns of Saffron Walden and Braintree. Nearby villages include Great Bardfield, Great Sampford, and Wethersfield.
There has been a settlement in Finchingfield since historical records of the area began. Also, there is archaeological evidence for a Roman villa 400 metres south-southwest of the village church. The place-name 'Finchingfield ' is first attested in the Domesday Book of 1086, where it appears as Fincingefelda, a name that means 'the field of Finc or his people'. The village was an official stop for horse-drawn coaches travelling from London to Norwich.
Spains Hall, the nearby Elizabethan country house, was built in the early fifteenth century. The hall is named after Hervey de Ispania, who held the manor at the time of the 1086 Domesday Book. Since then, the land has been owned by four families: the de Ispania family, the Kempe family, who acquired it when Margery de Ispania married Nicholas Kempe in the early fifteenth century, the Ruggles family (later the Ruggles-Brise family), and currently celebrity chef Jamie Oliver with wife Jools and their 5 children. The hall was the hub of the community, those families owning much of the village, and employing most of the villagers.
The current house dates to c. 1570, with earlier remains that include part of a medieval king post roof. The principal façade was remodelled by William Kempe in approximately 1585 and Dutch gables were added by Robert Kempe in 1637.
A park of approximately 7 hectares surrounding the house was landscaped to a plan by Humphry Repton near 1807. The new landscaping remade some of the series of early seventeenth-century fishponds as ornamental water features, which gradually, are being restored today. Nearer the house are a large (2 hectare) and early (sixteenth-century) walled garden, and a mid-nineteenth-century formal garden. The grounds also include the remains of a moat around an earlier house. The house was designated as a Grade I listed building in 1953.
The listing summary completed in 1953 includes this summary: "Great house. Circa 1570, with C17, C18 and C19 additions, incorporating a fragment of an earlier house, c.1400-50. Red brick, mainly English bond, some Flemish bond, with some plastered timber framing, roofed with handmade red clay tiles".
The eighteenth-century dovecote and nineteenth-century coach house and stables were converted in 2005 into an Essex venue for weddings, conferences, and other events. Conversion of Spains Hall followed and in 2010 it was opened to civil ceremonies, wedding receptions, parties, and corporate events.
Bakers of Danbury undertook restoration works to Spains Hall, winning the RICS East of England (Building Conservation category) award in 2011 for their work.
In January 2019 the house was purchased by Jamie Oliver. The family moved into the building that year and made some changes, according to a news report: "Along with the greenhouse, the application also sought to make changes and repairs to windows in two bedrooms and the bay window in one of the mansion’s drawing rooms". As of early 2021, the website for the Spains Hall Estate, now separate from the Hall itself, indicated that paying guests were accepted in self-catering cottages and a campsite; tour tickets were also available as were tickets to photography tours and "farm rides".
It often is called the most beautiful village in England, a "picture-postcard" village and one of the most photographed, with a duck pond and village green surrounded by Georgian and medieval cottages; St John the Baptist Church on the hill; an eighteenth-century windmill; three public houses; Post Office; tea rooms; a hall; a primary school; and a doctor's surgery. It often has appeared in television programmes, films, and commercials, as well as on chocolate boxes, biscuit tins, and other products.
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