Cornish Renovation
Jane and Anthony Hosking’s creative restoration of their waterside home reflects their enduring love for its beautiful Cornish setting
Nestling by a stream at the bottom of a steep, wooded valley, and all but invisible from the road, Jane and Anthony Hosking’s home on Cornwall’s Lizard Peninsula is a world away from the county’s bustling tourist centres. ‘It’s an amazing spot,’ says Jane. ‘No one knows we are here.’
With its large, timber-framed kitchen-diner, two snug living rooms, and four cosy bedrooms, Wildwood Holt could not be more different from the near-derelict, two-up-two-down, cob and stone cottage the couple bought over 30 years ago. Back then, it was almost hidden among overgrown trees and bushes and had no electricity, phone or running water.
‘Nothing had been done in 60 years and it was falling apart; however, we weren’t deterred,’ says Anthony. ‘My family farmed here for generations. It was an opportunity we couldn’t let go.’
The couple embarked on what would become a decades-long labour of love to restore the property. ‘It wasn’t easy, especially at first,’ explains Jane. ‘We would spend hours fetching water and cutting wood, and the range cooker kept filling the rooms with smoke, so everything was covered in soot all the time.’
The cottage was stripped back to the walls, before being rebuilt. Apart from plumbing, wiring and rendering, Anthony and Jane tackled the work themselves, tirelessly digging up and relaying floors, replacing ceilings, renovating windows and beams, and patching the roof. By the time Jowan was born, 10 years later, they had created a comfortable, two-bedroom home.
Within a couple more years, just before the arrival of their daughter, Teän, they had built a timber-framed extension, adding a more familyfriendly kitchen-dining room, and two mo
