Tuscan Holiday Cottage update – Nov 19

Our Tuscan Holiday Cottage is under way. It looks like a building site but then again, it is! Just thought I’d put an update together as I’m over for meetings and checking on progress.

With a little bit of luck our Tuscan Holiday Cottage will be ready to open it’s doors to guests around Easter 2020. So far the builders have taken up crumbly concrete floors and re-laid nice and level, put all the ducting in for the electrician, plastered the kitchen and bathroom, and put RSJ’s in the cellars to hold the ceilings up, thus ensuring the whole lot doesn’t fall down!

Oh, and on top of that they’d made a real mess of the garden as there was a lot of junk to clear from the cellars before they could start work!

I haven’t really published photos of the interior of the house before as it just looked like an old, grotty, dated building. I know from years of renovating and development that a lot of people can’t envisage what something will look like if they are presented with ‘before’ photos, way before anything is finished.

I’ve now decided to share some photos of the progress of our Tuscan Holiday Cottage as I’d promised, because it is now very evident that this is not the finished article!

We all know that a renovation project starts from the bottom upwards. With three cellars, the first thing that needed to happen was for a whole bunch of RSJ’s to go in to make sure this old farm building doesn’t come crashing down around our ears!

Ok, so to the inside of the house itself. The floor was very old and crumbly, having not been laid very well originally. So all that had to come up, then a new concrete screed was laid, with a reinforcing mesh inside it. This is the lounge. I promise you it won’t stay pink and it won’t have that old wall heater! Your Tuscan Holiday Cottage will feature a modern air conditioning and heating system. Warm in the colder months and nice and cool in the Summer. And boy, will you need that!

There was originally a corridor from the dining room, with the bedroom, lounge and bathroom opening up off it but we’ve taken it out to provide much more light and space. You will have the most amazing views across the valley towards Lucca from these windows

Ok, let’s start imagining what it’s going to look like soon shall we? Well, I’ve just been tile shopping and am over the moon with what I’ve found! Throughout the house we will have these traditional terracotta floor tiles. They have a lovely texture to them and they are so typically Tuscan. They will be in every room, except the bathroom, which will have a gorgeous grey slate, to offset the white, bevelled wall tiles. I don’t have pics of these, but they look awesome and the quality as you’d imagine with the Italians, is just amazing. Mind you, so is the price!

I’m especially pleased with some wall tiles I’ve found for the kitchen of our Tuscan Holiday Cottage. These are crazy money but so worth it. I’ve just put a kidney on eBay to pay for them! They are just 7.5cm square each and we’ll have them running around the kitchen units as a splashback. The kitchen itself will feature some very old pieces that I’ve picked up at auctions and antiques showrooms back home in Suffolk. We will have an eclectic mix of traditional Tuscany, combined with a slice of Suffolk. I can’t wait to share it all with you!

We may go for fairly plain wall lighting in most of the rooms, with these natural plaster ones that you simply paint the same colour as the walls, though I’m also looking at some really cool copper and brass ones too! We’ll just be going with fresh, plain white walls for all the internal rooms and then we’ll make sure we have plenty of interest with lots of lamps, furniture, pictures and accessories to spice things up.

I do want to make a statement in the lounge though so will have something like these beautiful picture lights on the walls in there.

Whilst we are on the subject of lighting, we’ll probably have these beauties on the exterior walls;

Ok, I’m off for a meeting now with the builder, architect and project manager, so I hope this little update will start to give you a feel for what’s been happening and how things will start to take shape. I will share some news soon of the sort of furniture I’ve been buying for the house, but rest assured it’ll all feel very ‘Woodfarm’. And I know that’ll go down well with you, otherwise you wouldn’t be reading this!

Arrivederci

EDIT OCTOBER 2024 – If you want to see the whole story of renovating Woodfarm Tuscany, we have a blog and video for you.