Property: Rising from the ashes: Oakfield in Berkshire was burnt to the ground. After restoration it's the same only different, says Anne Spackman

As you turn into the tree-lined drive at Oakfield in Berkshire, you see a house sitting as comfortably in its setting as you would expect a place to do that has been virtually unchanged for three centuries.

It must have looked like this when the Milne-Watsons set off for dinner one night eight years ago. And when their tenants in the West Lodge went out a little later, everything seemed equally tranquil.

But behind closed shutters in the wood-panelled reception hall, a fire was taking hold. The tenants returned to the sight of flames shooting out of the first-floor windows. By the time the blaze was put out, only two walls of the house remained.

The Milne-Watsons had lived at Oakfield, outside the village of Mortimer, for 30 years. They decided, with no shortage of advice from outsiders, to rebuild it.

Oakfield is a classic English country house. It sits in its own parkland, with a large lake, two lodge cottages, a long drive and beautiful lawns and shrubs. Its setting has been remarkably untouched by the suburban sprawl of the Thames corridor.

The house, originally built 300 years ago, had undergone the usual number of metamorphoses, ultimately becoming the dower house for the neighbouring Wokefield Estate about 100 years ago.

A painting by Felix Kelly (born 1916), which now sits above the fireplace where the great blaze began, shows an almost identical house, but for the second-floor servants' quarters - probably added in Victorian times - which the family decided not to rebuild.

'After the fire the place looked awful,' recalls Andrew Milne-Watson. 'It was just like a film set. We sat down and drew up plans which would complement what was here before, but would be more practical for 20th-century living.'

They called in to help them Anthony Jaggard, a Dorchester architect with a reputation for this type of restoration work. He has just finished work on two other fire-damaged houses, one in Cornwall, the other in Wiltshire.

House fires have become far more frequent over the past few years, Windsor Castle being the most famous victim. 'I suspect we are coming to terms with the lifespan of our wiring systems,' Mr Jaggard says.

In this field, the research often takes more time than the actual rebuilding. For Wardour Castle in Wiltshire Mr Jaggard tried quarries across England and France for the right stone. In the end, he had to get planning permission to reopen a quarry at Wardour, from which the original stone came.

Oakfield was less complicated. Mr Jaggard discovered a very good set of photographs in the archives of Reading University showing the house in its Edwardian incarnation. Because the house had been altered over the centuries, a number of different sizes and shapes of brick had been used. Some had to be made specially, others Mr Jaggard found through his network of building experts. It is just possible to see the joins on the north wall of Oakfield.

On the south side, the wisteria which winds up to the first storey reinforces the sense of permanence. Its roots survived both the fire and two years of trampling by builders. The camellias that grow on the small terrace by what is now the family room proved equally robust.

Inside, the house has undergone more extensive change. The vast entrance hall, with a log basket large enough to hang beneath a hot-air balloon, is now at the back rather than the front of the house. With the dining-room, it used to occupy the sunniest side, now taken up by the drawing-room and library.

In both rooms, at Anthony Jaggard's suggestion, the floors are of elm. He says: 'With all the elm trees disappearing, we thought it might be rather fun to use the wood while we could still get it. People will look back and date the house by things like that.'

Upstairs, the lay-out was partly dictated by the windows, and partly by the family's needs. Oakfield has just five bedrooms - not many for a country house - and three bathrooms, one of them enormous.

It has also gained a back staircase; Mr Milne-Watson explains why. 'My son, who was six months old at the time, was here 12 hours before the fire began. He was upstairs with the au pair. There would have been no way they could have got down.'

There were the usual conflicts between authenticity and convenience, with English Heritage weighing in for the former. English Heritage is anathema to most architects, but Mr Jaggard is rather more tolerant.

'English Heritage has its fashions, and the current fashion is that every house has its history,' he says. 'So if you just happen to have this lean-to lavatory right by the front door, you should not move it because it's part of the history.

'I was at the opening of a house in Dorset the other day, and I teased the woman from English Heritage about the scaffolding. It's been there 20 years now, so I asked her if it would require listed-building consent before it could be taken down.'

Restoring an old house is far more difficult than building a new one, because the family themselves become very tied to the peculiarities of their house. They can find themselves recreating eccentricities which have become part of their life, but which would appear ludicrous if you were starting from scratch.

The Milne-Watsons have gone for a compromise. The house feels old and established, but the plumbing and heating systems all work. 'It is probably in better historical condition now than it was when we came here,' says Mr Milne-Watson, 'because people would have mucked about with it over the years.'

While the rebuilding was in progress, the family moved into a house in the former stables. Now, with their lives more centred on London, they are keeping that and selling the main house with its lake, lodges and 77 acres. Knight Frank & Rutley has set a guide price of pounds 1.6m.

Anthony Jaggard, John Stark & Partners, 0305 262636.

(Photographs omitted)