Five luxury houses could be built in countryside on the edge of one of the prettiest villages on the edge of Swindon.

And wait till you meet the neighbours.

Because they are alpacas.

Anyone who has a hankering to live right next door to cute South American camelids will be keeping a keen eye on a new application for planning permission lodged this week with Swindon Borough Council.

Applicants Firecracker Developments wants to build five detached executive homes next door to Honeyfield Alpaca Farm in the Marsh in Wanborough, about a mile north of the village centre.

The application to planners admits the site is “not within the settlement boundary, but there are a number of dwellings in close proximity to the site.”

The plans show “five executive dwellings in its own large enclosed plot, with generous gaps between the buildings” arranged either side of a short access cul de sac off The Marsh.

Each house would have its own garage, one attached and the other four detached.

Firecracker Developments says: “All retain and further enhance the visually important strong hedge and tree belts around the site. Ensuring the introduction of low density development reflects the rural characters of lower Wanborough.

Four of the houses would have five bedrooms and one five - and the report says: “The design pays particular attention to the dwellings recently built on the adjacent site at Duckbridge as they are a good example of executive dwellings in the countryside.”

While Firecracker Developments owns the small copse fronting onto The Marsh at the site, most of the land to be used belongs to the alpaca farm.

It is used as paddock for the animals grazing and the developer says using the land for housing would have no impact upon the farm’s operations, which means, should permission be granted and the houses built, the new residents could look north east and see cute alpacas in the next door field.

If they look south or south west, on the other hand, they may be in for a less bucolic view.

The site proposed for the houses is just a few hundred metres from the land that pharmaceutical manufacturer and distributor Wasdell Group wants to use for its new headquarters.

The company has already lodged plans to build a new warehousing facility on fields between Wanborough and the A419, and it also wants permission to build a secondary ‘science park’ to attract high technology companies to the area.

That application has been opposed by locally-organised group the South Swindon Protection Group and attracted more than 500 letters of objection.

Nobody from Firecracker Developments, or its agents DPDS Groups was available to comment.