FOR a house that has changed hands many times Breccles Hall is in an almost miraculous state of preservation. Even the normally dry as dust Grade I listing description bursts into eulogy, proclaiming: “This house is of national importance on account of the almost complete survival of wooden and metalwork fittings”.

The approach is up a stately double avenue of oaks leading to a tall brick archway perfectly framing the view of the west-facing entrance front. The instant appeal of the house comes from the mellow red brick perfectly matched by the clay roof tiles. Both have a sprinkling of lighter and darker hues, subtleties that come when a house has mellowed over centuries.

The Elizabethans took advantage of the flat Norfolk countryside near Watton to create a series of large walled gardens, with battlemented tops stepped up over the archways.

At the back of the house you cross a 300-yard long moat into a “wilderness” (as the Elizabethans would have called it) of light woodland, threaded through with fast-running streams and ablaze with carpets of snowdrops such as are found only in Norfolk.

This Elizabethan house was built in 1583 by Francis Wodehouse. His entrance front appears to be built on a typical Elizabethan E-plan but, teasingly, the two-storey porch is an addition by the architect Detmar Blow, who repaired the house in about 1900. The match of the brick is so good that only the join with the earlier brick shows what was done.

Blow also added an office wing “containing every adjunct of modern domesticity”, according to Country Life in 1909, but with brickwork and mullions blending perfectly with the old. The next year Breccles was sold to Edwin Montagu, who while Secretary of State for India was impressed by Lutyens’s work in Delhi and commissioned him to do work at Breccles in 1918. Montagu’s many guests included Noël Coward and Winston Churchill.

Requisitioning in the Second World War added further interest. There are shell pattern decorations done by local children evacuated from coastal areas and a remarkable mural of Bacchus in the hall by Rex Whistler shortly before he was killed in Normandy.

In the past three years another gentle wand has been waved over the house. Central heating has been introduced so Breccles is pleasantly warm throughout. The rooms have been given a gentle but persistent spring clean so that woodwork and panelling are everywhere in lustrous condition. Broad ancient floorboards survive in numerous rooms.

The big challenge of the house is the 72ft-long great hall running the length of the entrance front. There is a case for turning this back into two rooms (as it was in 1909). Otherwise, a new owner needs the panache of a Sir Timothy Clifford [the former director of the National Galleries of Scotland] to furnish the room with splendidly flamboyant sofas, gilt tables and Old Masters double-banked around the walls.

There are two good south-facing living rooms with early 18th-century panelling. Between them is a ravishing Elizabethan staircase, rising in long straight flights, not the short flights common in the 16th century. The 7ft-long treads, each formed of a single piece of oak, match the silvery woodwork on the walls. There is no skirting, cornice or door frame; in fact it’s the 16th-century equivalent of today’s minimalism. The spiral stairs threading through the building are also all of wood, each a little marvel of ingenious construction.

Breccles Hall cries out for someone who has or wants to form a collection of paintings and furniture, ancient or modern. There is much more to do, but a more tranquil and secluded place to spend 20 blissful years is hard to imagine.

The hall is being sold for £3.5 million through Knight Frank, 020-7629 8171

Times recommends

• Fall in house sales hits builders, estate agents and mortgage brokers
• Why the property credit crunch favours cash buyers
• The blood-curdling history of Quarrelwood House