It sits in the Pang Valley, a slice of West Berkshire bordering the M4 between Junctions 12 and 13.
Made up of woodland, farms and picture-perfect villages, it stretches from The Ridge, a strip of high ground near Newbury, to Pangbourne, on the River Thames.
'This is a fascinating part of the world,' says local author Dick Greenaway, who has lived in the Pang Valley village of Ashampstead for 40 years.
'You are close to Oxford, Reading and London, yet the area is sparsely populated. This is real countryside, too, with landscapes that range from chalk downs to woodland and marshes around the river. It's also rich in history, with features dating back to Roman times.'
The charms of the Pang Valley are not widely known, but the seriously wealthy are in on the secret.
When Chris Tarrant was looking for a home where he could indulge his passion for fishing, he bought a large house with two fishing ponds in Bucklebury, not far from the Middletons.
Sir John Madejski, the Reading tycoon worth £250 million who set up the car magazine Auto Trader and is now chairman of Reading Football Club, had his pick of locations on which to erect his Lutyens-style mansion a few years ago, but chose to build it at Stichens Green, near Streatley.
George Michael lives in Goring and, behind the high hedges of the substantial houses in the area, you will find the families of many well-heeled businessmen.
The Middletons exactly matched the profile of typical Pang Valley buyers when they moved to Bucklebury from nearby Bradfield in 1997.
'Most are in their late 30s to 50s,' says Tim Sherston, of Jackson Stops & Staff.
'Schooling is the major attraction. They want their children to go to prep schools near the family home - either as day pupils or weekday boarders.
'Schools such as Elstree, Brockhurst and St Andrew's at Pangbourne enable them to do that.'
The valley is sprinkled with sought-after villages. Aldworth, home to Richard Ingrams of The Oldie, has a rustic pub, The Bell, where using a mobile phone can lead to you being asked to leave.
Red-brick Bradfield, almost entirely owned by the public school Bradfield College, is impressive, and Stanford Dingley, with its two pubs and a church, is pure chocolate box.
Further east are the Thames-side villages of Pangbourne, Goring and Streatley, the setting for Kenneth Grahame's The Wind In The Willows, which have a holiday atmosphere in summer when walkers clog the footpaths and pleasure craft putter about on the river.
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