A small dwelling, originally built to be close to the workplace, often by the employers, sometimes by the occupants with the help of friends and family. The homes of fishermen, miners, mill workers, farmhands, woodsmen and crofters, are all cottages in essence even when they don’t exactly fit the chocolate box thatched cottage caricature. Because rural work depends on natural phenomena cottages are very often set in beautiful surroundings such as woods, valleys and seashores. Cottages are humble dwellings, compact and concise, containing only the essentials for living –a big fire for warmth and cooking, a room for eating and sitting somewhere to sleep, and an area for washing.
Small windows keep out draughts and wind and pay no attention to the view beyond –as the last thing anyone who had spent all day outside battling with the elements wanted to do is to look out of a window.
Cottage owners are very different now that many are second homes, the setting and the landscape now the whole point of the building.
‘Cottage style’ exemplifies the concept of simplicity at it’s very best; fundamental and practical–there was no money or room for waste or profligacy–using local materials and craftsmanship: home-made homes.