We're absolutely delighted that Smugglers Lane has just been listed among the best holiday cottages in Cornwall on the Conde Nast Traveller website.
It was quite a surprise as we had no idea that our guest was a journalist until she contacted us after her stay to let us know that we were going to be featured.
The highlights of her holiday included the "sense of proper seclusion", exotic plants in the garden and the Scandic-meets-rustic interiors.
She was also impressed by the cottage's proximity to the brilliant beaches at Prussia Cove and Praa Sands, which are just a short drive away.
You can read the full article here https://www.cntraveller.com/gallery/holiday-cottages-cornwall
Our own house has been in the media recently too, with features in Country Living, Country Living Modern Rustic and the American magazine, Magnolia Journal.
For those of you who aren't familiar with the setup here, Chris and I live in what was once the main farmhouse and what are now our three holiday cottages began life as farm outbuildings. When we moved here seven years ago we began a comprehensive programme of renovations on the entire property and if you've stayed with us before you'll notice that, although they each have their own design personality, the cottages share several features with the main house.
When it comes to interiors, I favour a modern rustic style, preserving as much of the character of the building as possible but introducing more modern elements. In both our own house and Carter's Croft, for example, we've used traditional lime pointing and kept some of the stonework exposed. The wet room in Smugglers Lane shares the same Carrara marble and Vola brassware as our own bathroom and in The Old Granary, as at home, we've installed Douglas fir flooring and used wood reclaimed from our old floorboards for the kitchen cabinetry.
One of my great passions is mid-century design and in the house, you'll find pieces by Borge Mogensen, Hans Wegner and Arne Jacobsen. In the cottages, I've sourced a lot of vintage Ercol furniture, including the wonderful Love Seats in both the Granary and Smugglers. You'll also find occasional chairs by Mogensen, Lena Larsson and Ilmari Tapiovaara, as well as lighting by Poul Henningsen and Jorn Utzon.
I'm a firm believer that books do furnish a room; in fact I'm not sure there's a room in our house that doesn't have bookhelves. Each of the cottages has its own little library too and Smugglers Lane is home to a vintage Penguin Donkey and some of the duplicate volumes from my own vintage Penguin book collection.