Televisions have come a long way in the last decade. We have progressed from gigantic plastic sets that dwarfed the living room to wafer-thin sleek metallic models. However, our desire for those fantastic large screens remains as strong as ever, and thus the dilemma...
Remember imagining your dream house as a child? I am guessing that – at a minimum – it included a secret bookcase door, a slide to get downstairs, and voice-activated lights. Well people, I have discovered that with minimal fuss and little cost, part of...
Source: Pendleton USA This week we look at a seriously cool heritage product from the USA, The Pendleton Blanket. My sister-in-law hails from Portland, Oregon. As a wedding gift she and her husband gave us an absolutely massive woollen blanket. Now I have to confess...
Period Piece #4: Fiskars Kitchen Scissors Back in 1649 a Dutch bloke called Peter Thorwöste turned up in a tiny hamlet in Southern Finland and set up an ironworks. The hamlet was called Fiskars Bruk and lent its name to the company Peter founded. Fiskars duly set...
Our dining room is dark. It has no windows to the outside and the only natural light comes via the kitchen. The gloominess is compounded by the back of our house being east-facing and receiving little direct sunlight. I’ve wondered how best to tackle this shadowy room...
Since moving into our house I have been steadily building up a ‘stable’ of power tools. My approach has been to save up for good quality tools and buy them when I can, though borrowing (on permanent loan) from a generous dad has also proven fruitful. I’ve...
I wondered the other day what our area might have looked like around the time our house was built 124 years ago. I thought to myself wouldn’t it be cool if there was a website where I could tap in our postcode and instantly be presented with a high-resolution, colour,...
No house that is been standing for 100+ years is going to be in perfect nick, so when viewing a period property there is always an element of judgment about what you are happy to live with, how much you want to take on, and how much making the necessary changes will...
Buying a house can be a right pain. More than once we thought we had a done deal only for things to fall though. The task was also complicated by fussiness. My head said this is your first home, you won’t be here forever, just find something cheap and do it quickly....
In the second half of the twentieth century an evil bug took hold of period terraces, spreading like wild fire from house to house, street to street. The bug’s name was Artex – an asbestos ridden monster that infected ceilings nationwide, causing eyesores that have...
