News and New Arrivals at the Vintage Home Shop!

Here is a selection of the most recent arrivals to grace the Vintage Home Online Shop. Above is a wonderful 1930s oil painting of two young children; it is totally charming! Below is a 1919 print of a beautiful young lady. The artist W J Howie was renowned for painting pretty ladies and his work was also reproduced on postcards.

We are also thrilled to bring you this pair of extremely rare Victorian religious prints. These are the work of Catherine Klein, one of the world's most celebrated floral artists. Her work was widely reproduced on postcards and in Victorian gift books, and occasionally, original prints such as these can be found. If you visit our News Page you can read all about a particularly special Klein...

As well as prints and paintings there are some pretty yet practical items for the home such as this impressive china jug - it's a real beauty with its gorgeous rosy blooms...

...and this Barbola mirror is framed with exquisite roses.

We're not only tempting you with these and many more antique and vintage treasures, we have also introduced a maximum £10 p&p charge within the UK During June; order as many items as you like and you only pay £10 to have them delivered to your door! Plus, from today, anyone who joins our mailing list will receive 10% off their first order. With lots of vintage stock to be added in the coming weeks there will be plenty of choice for everyone - we do hope you can pop in for a browse...

Where is Harrison Ford when you need him?

If you've seen the film 'Witness' then you'll know what I mean by the title of this post! Firstly, no, that isn't our house after the recent wind and rainstorms, it's The Cider Barn which has been neglected for decades and is Mike's project for the warmer - and drier - days throughout Summer. (Note the positive use of the words warmer and drier, we WILL have a good Summer this year, won't we..?)

Of course, if we had all the 'menfolk' from the village helping us to 'raise the barn' then it would be re-built in no time; maybe I should start making sandwiches and lemonade and set up the trestle tables... We had considered taking the barn down and putting something else up in its place but then we had a visit from a charming couple in their late 90s. The husband lived in our house in the 1930s and told us so many interesting stories, including how this was called the Cider Barn and in its heyday, gallons of cider were produced in this small barn.

We knew then that we had to rescue it. Mike has stripped the pan tiles from the roof and will be relaying them once he has replaced most of the smaller wood batons - fortunately the oak timbers are good and solid. There will be some re-building of the timber clad side and front, and a new window. Then there's the floor to dig out and re-lay. We found some painted cobbles in the soil but we will need to lay a more practical floor as we intend to use the barn when it's finished.

Oh look, here comes someone to lend a hand...

Perhaps not, don't think he's going to be helping today, especially when there's so much for a cat to explore...

Back again soon with news of the website...

From Dreary to Dreamy...A Bedroom Transformation

So many of you have asked to see photos of our new home so I thought I would share these with you. Our house is full of feature and needed lots of work to bring out the best of those features.
Here is the master bedroom, once very different as you can see by the 'before' pictures, but now it is light and airy with its timbers stripped of black paint, the fresh, white walls and a soft painted floor. I have mixed in some of the before photos so you can see just what a challenge we had!





We have carried out more detective work and now understand the house to be almost 400 years old. Such wonderful history lies within it - but also a great deal of work! There's still plenty to do so between the house and the website, we are never short of something to do! We have some surprises planned for you regarding the Vintage Home Website and will be announcing these soon, in the meantime, we hope you enjoy the photos.

If you go down to the woods today...

Although we are keeping busy with the website and the major task of renovating the house, we are also enjoying our amazing garden.

We are lucky enough to have a huge garden which has a secluded woodland area and as you can see, our cat Dennis loves exploring it.

The garden is full of woodland plants including masses of aquilega in every shade of pink...

...and purple.



It's a very relaxing place, nice and shady on a hot day.

If you enlarge the photo above you can see the cow parsley which is as high as my shoulder in places!

Oh, hang on, who's this? Why it's Dennis again, our very own intrepid explorer!

Oh dear, I think we've blown his cover!

I wonder what he has heard, maybe the chirp of a bird - or perhaps the shaking of the crunchies!

We won't be doing much to the garden this year but we will be taking time to appreciate it, especially when the days are sunny and warm. I am currently uncovering old grapevines which we thought were long dead but they are starting to flourish. Who knows, maybe we'll be making some 'Vintage Home' wine in the future! I also discovered a gooseberry bush which is doing really well and we have several damson trees; it's been suggested we make some damson gin later in the year!

See you all soon with more photos and news of the website..

Apple Blossom Time!

A Very Happy Easter to you all! As well as adding lots of lovely vintage items to the website, we thought we would share some photos of the apple orchards which surround the hamlet. The orchards belong to Bulmers the cider makers. The sight and smell is wonderful and it's a delight to stroll down the avenues of trees.

The photo above reminds me of the pretty china by Royal Albert called 'Blossom Time'.

The photo below is looking towards the upper part of the hamlet. Our house is probably hidden somewhere amongst the trees!

The weather is wonderful this Easter so have a lovely time - we'll be back with more photos soon...

New Stock Arrived at Vintage Home!

Just a quick post to let you all know that we have added some wonderful stock to the website, there's the patchwork throw above and the prettiest prints of roses, including this beauty...

...this superb 1950s portrait...

...an exquisite antique tapestry and painted stool...

...and a gaily coloured handstitched bag.

New stock will continue to arrive in the coming days, including beautiful eiderdowns and sublimely pretty quilts. Please pop along when you have time and thank you to everyone who has made a purchase since our last update. Now that we are back to normal with the business we will be adding stock on a regular basis so there will be something for everyone! The work is continuing on the house and we promise to share some photos with you all soon. In the meantime, have a lovely weekend!

A Room With A View... and more Vintage Stock

Well, things have certainly moved on with the house and we thought it was time we shared some photos with you. These are definitely the 'before' photos in case you were wondering!

There has been an awful lot of work going on and despite these scary pictures, we are hoping to move in within a few weeks (honestly!)

Although the open and airy aspect is all the rage these days, we thought we would stick with tradition and re-lay the floor in the bedroom!

We have discovered the house dates to the mid 1600s and we have been busy uncovering its amazing wealth of features. The photos above show just a small amount of the work being carried out in the house; there has also been a flurry of activity in the barn too!

Along with completely re-wiring the house and replacing the plumbing, we also decided to have the many timbers in the house sandblasted. Boy, is that messy! Basically, if you remove the roof of your house and pour in a third of Weymouth beach, that is what the aftermath is like. But the result was worth it and now the many, beautiful oak timbers are soft and mellow, having been stripped of their black paint. We also made an interesting discovery; tucked inside one of the large peg holes in a wall timber was a handwritten 'article of agreement' from 1769 detailing the renting of land between two people, one of whom presumably lived in the house at that time, so we will do some research on the names when we are settled. I love the last line which refers to the signing and reads: 'Here unto we have set our hands this 2nd day of February 1769.' So exciting to have a link to someone who lived there so long ago.


Well, it hasn't all been dust and debris, we have been out and about finding some vintage treasure for the website. Here is a selection of some recent Spring arrivals for the shop, such as the delightful daffodil tray above. There are some gorgeous rosy paintings, Springtime paintings and rosy blankets; plus a rare set of nursery scales; perfect for a very special Springtime arrival! These and more vintage items have been added in recent days and there will be more arriving in the shop in the next day or so. So if you have time, do pop along!






I am off to dream about a clean house filled with beautiful vintage treasures; see you soon, hopefully with less scary house photos next time!