History
A few years ago we took the opportunity to buy and renovate the cottage. The process took two years and our progress featured on the BBC’s Renovation Restoration program – they watched and filmed our struggle to sympathetically restore what was effectively a 50 year old time warp, lived in by a local woman called Phyllis.
We started out with a three stone built rooms and a byre building with mud internal walls, a thatched roof covered by asbestos cladding, compacted mud floor, without a toilet or a bathroom. We ended up with a gem (we think, anyway). We managed to save the mud walls, remove the asbestos (legally), resurface the internal walls with breathable lime render and install electricity (more than a rewiring job!). We kept the three rooms and installed a modern bathroom and kitchen in what was the byre. Each room is themed by century.
The sitting room is twentieth century with a turn of the century settee and 1950s chairs: we compromised here and installed a modern flat screen TV. You can take theming only so far, after all! It's a very welcoming room with a fireplace.
The middle room is eighteenth century, when it would have been kitchen, dining and living area for the entire family.
The bedroom is nineteenth century, with a brass bed, simple bedroom furniture but twenty-first century bedding, so no horsehair mattresses to itch on!