IT'S FUNNY that now we're back in the city, find myself still drawn to cosy cottages, especially stone ones like the one we left, or this one, yellow brick and covered in climbing roses. A four-bedroom manor house built in 1820, this listed cottage is located in Ampleforth, North Yorkshire...
Meteorologically speaking, we're in the final month of spring, but time has got away from us and we never had the chance to fully appreciate this season that comes before our favourite. For it's at this time of year, that the earth awakens from its deep sleep, shedding the icy weight of winter's discontent.
THIS INSTALMENT OF 10 IMAGES features the charming meanderings of Rachel Cooney, a second-hand shop enthusiast and the Creative Content Manager @daylesfordfarm, who is also in the process of renovating her first home. In fact, it was the image of her kitchen, below, that first caught our eye, with its tile backsplash and leaning artwork, island counter, antique jugs and wicker. Rachel's feed also features old cars in London streets and vintage finds in second shops, quiet corners of her ongoing renovation and more...
THIS WEEK'S Two Lovely Things features the front door curtain, something we've been coming across quite a bit recently, especially in English countryside décor. There are many reasons why one might hang an entrance curtain over their front door: as a beautiful way to frame the doorway, but also as a chic solution for reducing heat loss at home, as a heavy fabric curtain can help prevent cold air from passing through a draughty entranceway.
BITS AND PIECES of this quintessential English countryside cottage have been featured here before (without us realising that they were all from the same place) because Charlotte's Folly, as this Shropshire cottage is known, ticks all the boxes of the things we love lately: Stripes and Garden Rooms; Blue and Pinkish Brown; and of course, using Curtains Instead of Cupboards ...
A FEW MONTHS ago I turned a tall shelf on its side to use a console, leaving the now vertical shelf spaces below for storage. It looked good on top, but the spaces below looked cluttered, so I thought about getting a curtain made to hide everything. I was thinking about how, in European kitchens, the lower cupboards are often covered using curtains instead of cupboards, and always liked the idea for its versatility: just change up the fabric from a stripe to a floral for an entirely new look, or swap linen for silk to go from casual to formal ...
AS YOU PROBABLY already know, TIG was down due to technical issues with the server from late Friday afternoon until this morning―apologies to those of you who receive the newsletter and were unable to click through to the site from any of the links. For the first time in a very long time, there was no chance to sneak in a few extra moments of work over the weekend or catch up on upcoming projects, which meant making the most of the sunny mornings ...
Recently, P introduced me to Raindrop, a web extension that organises everything into tidy folders. In it, there is a folder where I keep TIG article ideas and that's where I remembered the home of English designer (and son of the late Terence Conran), Jasper Conran's, home in Bridport, a market town in Dorset, England ...
FELL DOWN a beautiful internet rabbit whole on my way to this place, the French country home of Cordelia de Castellane, the artistic director of Dior Maison and Baby Dior. Located an hour north of Paris, the five-acre estate dates back to the 15th century. de Castellane and her husband used to rent a small cottage on these grounds from the family friends who owned the property, long before it became their very own.
WE ARE MAKING GOOD progress with fixing our archives and 2018 is nearly complete. It's a long, tiresome process, but as we're in Lockdown 2.0, we have nothing but time. In fact, the past two weeks have been a flurry of activity, perhaps due to the lockdown, or perhaps because the days have been so grey and overcast and nearly all of the leaves have fallen off the trees ...
I ORDERED an exercise bike online last Thursday, even before the announcement on Saturday night of a second nationwide lockdown here in England. A few months into the last lockdown, we ended up ordering enough gym equipment to turn the spare room upstairs into a fitness studio. But after all the delicious bread and pasta and wine of the last lockdown ...
THINGS HAVE BEEN a bit stressful lately―our site is full of holes at the moment where images should be (long story); I am currently locked out of the TIG facebook account (Does anyone have a fix for this?); and the pandemic is taking hold again...
ONE OF THE BEST things about the changing of the seasons is all the different fruits and vegetables that signal each one. Summers in Spain meant sandía in the mornings and springtime means lots of sweet, dark cherries. Right now, in early autumn, it's apples, hanging heavy from all the trees scattered about the countryside, and my most favourite of all, fig season ...
THIS INSTALMENT OF 10 IMAGES features the work of Abbie Mellé, a freelance lifestyle, interior and travel photographer based in the Southern Highlands of New South Wales ...
Despite actually living it for the past year and a bit, only came across the term cottagecore recently. Cottagecore (also known as farmcore, countrycore, naturecore, honeycore or warmcore) is the internet aesthetic taking over our screens lately with its ultra-romanticised interpretation of rural and countryside life ...
