The Most Beautiful, Affordable Holiday Homes Restored and Repaired by the Landmark Trust

Landmark’s approach has always been to restore and repair using materials and techniques appropriate to the original construction of the building. They depend on traditional craft skills and their practitioners, and in doing so forge a reciprocal relationship: benefiting hugely from the skills of such craftspeople as thatchers, stonemasons, plasterers, carpenters, joiners and decorators. In turn, their projects help keep these precious skills alive.

At Cobham Dairy in Kent, Landmark’s latest project, Master Plasterer Philip Gaches has recreated detailed ribbed vaulting and hand-modelled corbels. Before the restoration work was underway, the plasterwork was crumbling away, and the building had been abandoned, its walls defaced with graffiti. Philip has restored the dairy’s delicate ceiling using historical techniques and following the architect’s original drawings dating to 1794. Working alongside have been Anna Castilla Villa, who started with Philip as a Prince’s Foundation apprentice, and his sons, therefore passing this traditional skill to a new generation.

Clavell Tower, which stands proud on a cliff at Kimmeridge Bay in Dorset, was a victim of coastal erosion until Landmark stepped in. Over centuries the tower has inspired writers including Thomas Hardy and P.D, James. Back in 2002, it stood empty and derelict – it was dangerously close to slipping away forever. So acute is Landmark’s will to save remarkable places, that they disassembled the tower before rebuilding it further back from the cliff edge. Each brick had to be numbered and stored in crates, before being rebuilt, using the help of technical photography and planning. They left the old foundations to record where the original tower stood.

With every purchase from this collection, we will be contributing to this fantastic conservation charity to ensure that their hugely important work can forge ahead and that the public can continue to enjoy holidays in extraordinary places.

To find out more about The Landmark Trust or book a ‘holiday in history’ visit www.landmarktrust.org.uk.