Product Description

Glimpsing a thatched roof, mullioned windows, or an open stable door, even the least curious traveller must wonder what the cottage is like inside. This delightful book reveals the ways in which clever and imaginative cottage owners have succeeded in retaining that all too elusive sense of age, without being forced to adopt the primitive standard of comfort endured by the original inhabitants. The author and photographer have searched countrywide from Berwick-upon-Tweed to the Lizard peninsular for interiors which still have quirky imperfections and beguiling architectural details. They have uncovered a wealth of charming cottages which, despite the passage of time and alterations made by successive generations, retain wonderful and poignant reminders of a way of life now vanished.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #405522 in Books
• Published on: 2001-06-14
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 160 pages

About the Author
Hugh Lander is a specialist writer on the history and treatment of old buildings, and is the author of several books, including Do's and Don'ts of House and Cottage Restoration and The House Restorer's Guide. Hugh Lander currently lives in Redruth, Cornwall Peter Rauter is one of our most foremost still-life and location photographers, he gives a detailed guide to the techniques and equipment he uses for interiors photography. Peter Rauter currently lives in London, NW6.

Customer Reviews

A lovely book, informative and a treasure to own
A Lovely book to own, full of wonderful photos of real homes, brilliant for decorating hints, ideas, but better than that, as some pictures take you right back to the reality of living in a cottage. I used it to show the builders what I wanted and cribbed ideas again and again, now I am on to decorating and its back out on the coffee table. I should have got the hardback!!

A beautifully presented glimpse of how cottages used to look
From across the country and through six centuries, Hugh Lander shows what cottages and cottage life were like. Each featured cottage is photographed in colour to show what makes it special. An atmospheric and haunting image of a time passed is left in the readers mind. Every time the book is picked up something different is seen. The text is brief but informative. As in Hugh Lander's other works a thorough and informed sympathy with period properties is evident on every page.

A valuable historical record
This book will probably not appeal to those looking for ideas on how to decorate and upgrade a cottage to suit a modern pastiche of country life. It's a very interesting look at English cottages which have not been modernised, or have had very little modernisation.

The author makes the intelligent and usually over-looked point that while many dream of a rural cottage existence, few would want to live the reality, which was often cramped, cold, grubby and squalid. He has tracked down a number of properties which have remained largely unchanged for decades, though a few have suffered a minor touch of gentrification - bunches of dried things hanging from rafters, kitchenalia-clutter etc.

The featured properties are from the counties of Norfolk, Cornwall, Cumbria, Devon, Wiltshire, Hampshire, West Sussex, Kent, Surrey, Suffolk, Durham, Hereford and Worcester, Shropshire, Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and several from London.

The first dozen or so pages (of over 150) are the author's introduction, which is worth reading, and the remainder of the book has pictures on every page, with an accompanying paragraph giving information about the property.

The photographs are all in colour and while some are slightly dark, this reinforces the point of the book, to show these properties before they are brought up to modern-day requirements. At the end of the book, the photographer explains the difficulties he encountered in achieving adequate pictures in homes with little space or natural light.

This is a valuable historical record of English cottage dwellings and of a way of living which few have the stamina or taste for today. Those who are looking for ideas on what colour tiles to put behind the Aga or how best to display a collection of old Bovril signs will be disappointed.