A House on a Hill, meet Cara of Whitehill Farmhouse

For anyone discovering it for the first time, what is Whitehill Farmhouse?

Whitehill Farmhouse is a lovingly restored shepherd's cottage on the Colquhalzie Estate in Perthshire — a house that spent half a century as a working home and has been transformed into a quiet retreat. It sits atop a hill, quietly removed from everything, surrounded by open countryside with far reaching views. It's a place to come and be properly still in a way that's increasingly hard to find.

What was the state of the house when you took it on, and what did you want to preserve of its history as the shepherd's home? 

The same man had lived there for forty years, and when I took it on it took the best part of a decade to find the courage and the clarity to know what it wanted to become. It always had lovely bones — there was never any question of that. The agonising was over the details. We spent a long time debating whether to raise the ground floor ceilings, which were under two metres, with a warren of small rooms below. Countless architectural iterations later, we made the decision that changed everything: strip the entire interior back and rebuild it around one magical main room, with a new wing behind for the bedrooms. We never looked back.

What we refused to compromise on was the exterior. Keeping the original brickwork and stonework intact was not the economical choice — but it was the right one. The integrity of the building depended on it.

What was it about this spot on the Colquhalzie Estate that made you want to take it on? 

Truthfully, I didn't choose it — it was gifted to me by my father, which was an extraordinarily lucky turn of events. It arrived as an undeniable liability on paper. But if you could override the practicalities — which I'm worryingly good at doing — there was an unmistakable romance to it. A house on a hill, hidden from all eyes, with views that hit you from every angle the moment you stepped onto the site.

Both my partner and I grew up in this part of Scotland, so there was something deeper at work too. We wanted somewhere to anchor our boys' childhood to, a place with roots, even while we were mainly living in London. Whitehills became that tether.

What was your inspiration for the interior?

The landscape. Every quiet moment I spent inside the house during the restoration pointed me back outside — to the colours of the hills across different seasons, to the textures of Scotland. We wanted to create a home that fused the old vernacular of the building with sympathetic contemporary additions, both architecturally and inside.

The guiding principle for the interiors became: bring the outside in. Natural materials throughout. A palette drawn from the seasons. And a strict no-print policy — only solid colour blocks. It sounds like a small rule but it shapes everything (bar a few exceptions); the house feels calm and cohesive because of it.

How do you want guests to feel when they stay here? 

Calm. Genuinely detached from everything. The measure of success for us is when whole days pass and nobody has felt the urge to go anywhere. We find it ourselves every time we're there — we're always surprised by how much time goes by before we feel any pull to leave the house or entertain the children. That quality of stillness is what Whitehill does best, and it's what we most want guests to take home with them.

With room for up to eight, how would you suggest a group makes the most of their time there? 

Resist the urge to over-plan. The temptation with a group is to fill every hour, but Whitehill rewards those who let the days find their own shape. A long breakfast that turns into a local walk. An afternoon at Gleneagles — whether that's the golf course, the spa, or simply lunch at the hotel. Evenings gathered around the table with no particular reason to move.

For those who want more structure, Perthshire is remarkably well-stocked: whisky distilleries, hill walks, farmers markets in Crieff, and some of the best fishing in Scotland all within easy reach. 

What kind of wildlife might guests expect to see around the farmhouse?  

From the main room you look out over highland ponies a few fields away.  Most days you will see roe deer in the neighbouring fields.  There are also brown hares, pheasant, partridge, a resident barn owl in the neighbouring barn, bats, red squirrels if you are lucky (we had one bounce across the glass door), migratory pink feet and grey lag geese and then multiple garden birds such as wagtails, robins, tits and goldfinch.  We had a guest who taught us about the Merlin app and now we enjoy learning all about these birds.  In the summer months swallows and house martins arrive which is wonderful.Red kites are a regular sight overhead — once you've spotted one, you'll find yourself scanning the sky for them constantly.

What's next for Whitehill Farmhouse?  

We hope to keep slowly adding to it — nothing dramatic, just considered enhancements that deepen the experience we already love when we're there ourselves. We have just introduced a fire kitchen for outdoors and would like to use the barns for an outdoor dining space cooked for by local talents. We are currently putting in a huge trampoline and ping pong table for the kids.  We have also started building the beginnings of a vegetable garden as we hope guests will be able to come here and enjoy home grown produce.  In time, we hope to have a quiet space to do yoga in, and a sauna and ice bath. 

Favourite spot to visit nearby?

It has to be Gleneagles, though perhaps not for the obvious reasons. Yes, the golf and the spa are exceptional — but it's the drive back to Whitehill afterwards, just three miles up the road, that reminds you how lucky you are. There's something about returning to the simplicity of the farmhouse after the grandeur of the hotel that makes both experiences feel better.