We've never lived in a house before that has a private parking area. All of our previous properties have had on-road parking, and because we lived in busy Mancunian suburbs, parking could be tricky. Often, our car would be parked away from the house as you basically...
When we bought our house in Istria in 2016, it looked very different to how it does today. It was kind of quarter renovated. The roof was new. The guttering was new. Windows had been fitted. And that was just about it. But, we saw the potential - even seeing ahead, to...
Ever since I saw this photo, I knew exactly what the garden at the rear of the house needed to look like. And, luckily, our builder was totally on board and could see the vision we had. Now, four months on, I couldn't be happier with the way it has turned out. For six...
It seems as if we have once again, shared our home and garden, with builders, for a considerable period of time. But we haven't really - it's only been four months - but we've been so keen and excited to get to the finishing line, that it just seems like we've lived...
It's only called the Secret Garden because it's partly hidden from view and it sounds a whole nicer than the back garden. Since the weather broke and we've had lovely long days of hot sunshine, the builders have been beavering away, trying to recreate our vision. Back...
With a reliable builder finally working with us, we've decided that we can't let him go to waste, and so are adding jobs to his ever-growing list. The weather has been pretty dire the last week or so - rain, thunder and lightning - and so work on the rear garden and...
So, finally, the whole of the front garden area - the piece we don't actually own, but care for and improve - and the concrete patio, are now covered in a thick layer of beautiful white pea gravel. Six cubic metres have been wheel-barrowed and distributed and raked...
We've thought long and hard about how much current renovation we want to do in our Istrian stone house, as it is imminently going on the market, as we have plans for a whole new adventure. However, with the demolition and clearance of the small stone cottage behind...
Way back in 2016, we viewed our house fro the first time, and this was the garden. Although "garden" is a bit of a stretch, looking back. A mucky, concrete patio and a patch of scrubby land, full of rubble and stones - proper ankle-breakers - and vines attached to an...
Having lived for six years now with the view out of our living room window being the small stone house we purchased from a neighbour, things are going to be looking very different, very soon. The vine...