How close Anty John’s is to Amanda Owen’s Ravenseat

Anty John’s has become almost as familiar to Owen family fans as the farmhouse where Amanda and Clive raised their nine children.

The centuries-old property is being transformed from a derelict building into a family home, with the painstaking project providing the central storyline for More4’s Our Farm Next Door: Amanda, Clive and Kids.

But it is not another property elsewhere in the Yorkshire Dales.

Anty John’s really is close to Ravenseat.

Anty John’s Aerial View (Image: CHANNEL4)

The farmhouse’s official name is High Smithy Holme, and it stands in Muker parish in Upper Swaledale.

Reports put the property roughly a mile from Ravenseat, while local walking routes link the two sites through Upper Swaledale.

The Yorkshire Dales National Park describes a route from Ravenseat across the moors towards Smithy Holme and down past Anty John’s.

That proximity helps explain why the building has become such a major project for the Owen family.

Instead of buying a conventional village or town house, they have taken on another historic property in the remote landscape that shaped life at Ravenseat.

Anty John’s is a Grade II-listed building dating from the early 18th century.

Historic England describes High Smithy Holme as a farmhouse and byre under one roof, built from coursed rubble and covered with stone slate.

Historic England also records a striking link to the property’s past.

The building is believed to have been home to Anthony Clarkson, who prepared Swaledale’s tithe maps.

That history has become part of the programme, with Amanda investigating former residents as work continues around her.

But history was only one of the family’s challenges when they took on the building.

Years of neglect left Anty John’s needing major work before it could become a home.

Viewers have watched the family and builders tackle the roof and stonework before moving on to floors, heating, plumbing, plastering and the rooms themselves.

The third series marked a major turning point.

After months of work on the exterior, the focus shifted inside.

Episodes showed the family firing up underfloor heating, progressing with plastering and Amanda hunting for a traditional fireplace as farming continued nearby.

Because it is close to Ravenseat, the two properties have become intertwined on screen.

One moment viewers are watching work inside the old farmhouse; the next, they are back with livestock, children and jobs at Ravenseat.

Ravenseat Farm (Image: CHANNEL4)

Even the journey between the properties can create problems.

In series three, Sid and Amanda investigated a collapsed bridge on a key track before Clive and Reuben joined the repair work.

That remoteness shows the scale of the Owens’ challenge.

Anty John’s is not a town-edge renovation with builders’ merchants and services nearby.

It stands in rugged Upper Swaledale, where narrow roads, harsh weather and long distances are part of daily life.

The two properties also mark different chapters in the Owen family’s story.

Ravenseat is where viewers first came to know Amanda, Clive and their nine children through Our Yorkshire Farm.

Anty John’s is the next chapter.

As the Owen children have grown up and the family’s television story has changed, the once-derelict farmhouse has become their next huge shared project.

The title Our Farm Next Door, therefore, is more literal than some viewers might realise.

Anty John’s sits in the same isolated corner of the Yorkshire Dales as the farm that made the Owens famous, keeping Ravenseat and the restoration within one family story.