This book will probably not appeal to those looking for ideas on how to decorate and upgrade a cottage to suit a modern pastiche of country life. It's a very interesting look at English cottages which have not been modernised, or have had very little modernisation.
The author makes the intelligent and usually over-looked point that while many dream of a rural cottage existence, few would want to live the reality, which was often cramped, cold, grubby and squalid. He has tracked down a number of properties which have remained largely unchanged for decades, though a few have suffered a minor touch of gentrification - bunches of dried things hanging from rafters, kitchenalia-clutter etc.
The featured properties are from the counties of Norfolk, Cornwall, Cumbria, Devon, Wiltshire, Hampshire, West Sussex, Kent, Surrey, Suffolk, Durham, Hereford and Worcester, Shropshire, Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and several from London.
The first dozen or so pages (of over 150) are the author's introduction, which is worth reading, and the remainder of the book has pictures on every page, with an accompanying paragraph giving information about the property.
The photographs are all in colour and while some are slightly dark, this reinforces the point of the book, to show these properties before they are brought up to modern-day requirements. At the end of the book, the photographer explains the difficulties he encountered in achieving adequate pictures in homes with little space or natural light.
This is a valuable historical record of English cottage dwellings and of a way of living which few have the stamina or taste for today. Those who are looking for ideas on what colour tiles to put behind the Aga or how best to display a collection of old Bovril signs will be disappointed.