Overview

In all of our accommodation we have aimed to lovingly restore, develop and interior design them in the most earth-friendly way we can, given resources and budget, as we are passionate about working with our planet rather than against it. We still manage to achieve a sense of ‘green elegance’ despite managing the business in this way. This means you can come here and enjoy a high quality holiday set in beautiful surroundings and contribute to reducing damage to our planet. Please refer to our Ethos for more information.

As a result of our approach to the business, we have been accredited with a Gold Green Tourism Business Scheme award in 2006 and again in 2009. In addition, we were finalists in the Sustainable Tourism Devon Environmental Business Initiative in November 2007.

Each of our apartments and cottages has been painted almost exclusively with Fired Earth paints and furnished with restored furniture from auctions, our private collection and the local newspaper classified section. It is amazing what beautiful items can be found! On the whole, the accommodation has organic linen and towels. Low energy bulbs, AAA rated white goods and boilers, and easy to use recycling and composting systems are in place throughout.

All stationery is made from recycled paper, as well as the toilet paper and kitchen roll. The plastic food and bin bags are made from bio-degradable plastic (if available) and the compost bags are compostable. The foil is also made from recycled aluminium too.

We use a green energy supplier for our electricity and offer other forms of heating which use wood from our estate.

Please see below for details of specific green items for each cottage and apartment:

Garden Rooms
The Garden Rooms has a (huge!) mattress made from organic latex and cotton, supported by a wooden Bilbao bed made from sustainable beech wood. The bed is covered in organic linen and a chenille organic throw. All these have been supplied by Green Fibres in Totnes.

The floor is made from oak sourced from sustainable sources and is adorned with rugs sourced from local auctions.

Lawn Apartment
This has been furnished almost exclusively with recycled furniture – from auctions, our collection or the local newspaper! The master bedroom has a beautiful old English oak wooden bed, French fruit wood wardrobe and mahogony chest of drawers.

The carpets are woollen and have been recycled from our stock. All the curtains are made from Vanessa Arbuthnott fabrics made in this country from pure cotton or linen.

Coach House

We have converted an old derelict garage into a three bedroom cottage. It has been insulated above building standardsand is double glazed throughout. The extension was built out of reclaimed local stone. It is run on green energy with a bio-mass boiler for the heating and supplements the hot water produced by the solar panels.

The special piece is the reclaimed Edwardian wooden stair case with 23 cm thick newel posts. The Wesley Barrel sofas were reclaimed through the local newspaper (for free!) and reupholstered in a designer fabric and offer wonderful comfort!

Out on the terrace you will find a beautiful reclaimed metal table and chairs, along with some exotic palms in large pots, also recycled though the local Classified section!

The Royal House

The main part of this Edwardian house has included restoring some of the old sash windows to provide a draft proof system which is considered to be more effective than double glazing.

Old Belgian wooden beds grace the twin bedroom and the Drawing Room has a restored boudoir grand, along with various items found at local auctions. Beautiful Belgian chandeliers recycled from a grand home in Hope Cove, hang gracefully from the high ceilings. The children's playroom is full of quality toys kindly donated by our children, purchased through the local newspaper or Born Again, a fantastic baby and children's shop to be found in Kingsbridge.