By Vaucluse Dreamer: Firstly I have to start with an apology – the last few months have been rather chaotic with one thing and another and I find that this really is the first time I’ve been able to sit and write about our little half-life in France for quite …

We wanted another fixer-upper and that’s certainly what we bought! As I wrote this article this tractor was wreaking muddy havoc in our yard. Buying a house is Provence is relatively straight forward. However, you do sometimes hear horror stories. Robin recently had a client that overpaid twice the worth …

Contributor blog post by Vaucluse Dreamer: It’s well over 2 years now since we finally picked up the keys and opened the door to our little house in Provence after so many years of dreaming about it. We couldn’t afford a perfect house with elegant gardens and a pretty pool and …

Contributor blog post by Caroline Longstaffe Don’t you ever wonder when you ask your friends how they are and they always say ‘wonderful’? Really, always wonderful, no-one’s life is wonderful all of the time, is it? I know I’m a sharer, I write a blog after all and admittedly I mostly write about …

Here are a few pictures of the before and after renovation of our living room. Can you believe the difference? The locals are, unfortunately for us, still so curious that I’m often confronted with a face pressed against our window… But thankfully, everyone seems impressed. Next we’d love to renovate …

Our Kitchen before and after the renovation If you’re interested in the full Before and After of our house renovation here in Provence; voila! The kitchen, when we first bought the house, was entirely brown. The last time the house had been renovated was in the 70s. The ceiling was …

Our tiny house is an awkward triangular shape. This is most evident in the upstairs room and the kitchen. Basically, anywhere you would need to put a large rectangular object– like a bed! Everything has been a compromise to make the space appear bigger as well as functional. Here …Continue …

It’s been a long eight months of renovation in our tiny village house here in Provence. We had a deadline, as the house was going to be filmed. Ever since the mania of trying to get everything to look presentable we’ve been taking it easy. I think Robin is still …

We figure that our kitchen is so tiny that in order to make it look good, everything in it has to have character and charm (well, maybe not the damn washing machine). I’ve fallen in love with all the shabby chic/farmhouse French kitchens that I’ve seen on Pinterest.  …Continue reading …

We’ve recently painted our upstairs with chaux/lime wash. We wanted to apply a wall covering that respected the age of the building. It’s important that old walls breathe in order to reduce trapped moisture. We quite liked the texture of the traditional lime wash (peinture à la chaux). We knew …