Our kitchens have always been a big part of our previous homes. Big in importance, but sadly, never big in size. Until we bought our Andalucian townhouse, and the footprint of the kitchen was huge,...
Renovation…
In the beginning, our blogs were mainly about destruction, demolition, debris, dirt, dust and sometimes, despair. It wasn’t easy, and sometimes, sitting in our new “home”, surrounded by boxed up belongings and builders’ tools and ladders and half built walls, we did wonder what we had done. But those walls do get built, the tools are finally dispensed with and the familiar belongings find new homes. We’re now able to document the “nice” bits of the reno project – the upcycling, the recycling, the repurposing. Making empty spaces into rooms. Breathing new life back into a house which needed a lot of TLC.
We hope that this journal will provide inspiration if you are embarking on a similar journey. We hope that it will give you the courage to just do it. And we hope that it will give you an unshakeable sense of belief that it can be done. Because it can. And guess what? We’re still doing it. The house may be finished – although we never say never – and so our focus has been on major demolition and construction work at both the front and rear of the house. Want to know all about our renovations?
Open a bottle of wine, curl up on the sofa and come and join us on our journey…
recent renovation blogs
crittal doors and crittal windows
I've long dreamed of crittal doors in our house, but it's never been a reality before. With hindsight, when we renovated our house in West Didsbury, we should have investigated these metal doors...
andalucian reno journey #3 : main bathroom
It's been a while since I've done a post about our renovation journey, because we've so busy since actually moving into the house - at long last! - on 26th August. The builders finally departed a...
andalucian reno journey #3 : stairs
The stairs up to the roof terrace, from the first floor, were awful. Just awful. Steep, enclosed and dark. They were so awful in fact, that we gave our builders a bit of a head-scratcher and said we...
new year : new project : the house
Summer 2022 ended with a bit of a whimper of the house front, as we reluctantly made the decision to take the house off the market and give up on our dream of The Printworks - the property we had...
getting plastered…
Throughout the house, in most of the rooms - apart from the ones we have totally taken apart and renovated - there is still evidence of it being an original Istrian house. A lot of the walls are...
an anniversary…
Sunday 16th October 2016 saw us meeting up with the couple who we were buying our Istrian home from, and staying over in the house. With hindsight, all a bit bizarre. But then, not much about this...
changing our view…
Three, nearly four years ago, we were very excited when one of the tumble down, abandoned houses beyond our property was demolished and heavy machinery arrived in the village. We were even more...
small steps : reno update
Over the summer, when we were averaging two or three house viewings a week and had some very serious interest in the house, if someone had told me that by October, we'd have taken it off the market,...
defining boundaries…
If there is just one thing we have learned from the journey of selling our renovated house in Istria, it's that boundaries are number one priority for nearly every potential purchaser. To the point...
kitchen reno : update 8
The kitchen was the first room in our Istrian stone house to receive the full renovation treatment. The units we had inherited were ripped out, the flooring taken out, the ceiling taken down, a new...
the snug reno : update 2
When we viewed our stone house in 2016, we found a very sorry looking room - a cellar, of kinds - down the stairs from the living room. The stairs were treacherous to say the least. Very thin pine...
secret garden reno : update 3
So, the last renovation blog detailed the thinking behind creating the Secret Garden. Although it's not a real Secret Garden - it's pretty obvious it's there when you look out of the living room...
project printworks : update 3
So, we've finally made a proper start. The old industrial unit, which has sat unloved and empty for as long as we've lived in Istria, is being internally dismantled in preparation for the major...
secret garden reno : update 1
A small, abandoned cottage - in need of much TLC - sits behind our main house. It belonged to one of our neighbours and when he offered to sell it to us, we decided to go for it. The little house,...
garden reno : update 11
After over a year of lockdown and travel restrictions, we've finally been double jabbed and now that we can access the EU vaccination certificate, the prospect of travel is on the horizon. Not...
upstairs bathroom reno : update 4
This rather lovely rustic, wooden A-frame ladder, hinged at the top and held together at the bottom with thick rope, hasn't really been utilised in our house as well as it could have been. It's...
garden reno : update 10
So, the exterior renovation of our house, continues apace. We've largely completed the interior renovation - but we never say never - and so our attention has been turned to the garden area around...
garden reno : update 9
We knew we had to tackle this part of the garden, because it was overgrown, messy, full of stones and rubble from previous renovation works and the trees were literally being strangled by vines and...