Over 3 centuries old cottage transformed into a superb holiday home

It's amazing how people in other countries manage to keep all the old houses, to keep refurbish and transform them making minimal changes, but adding maximum comfort. I've always wondered how they manage to save and make habitable, with all that a dwelling now entails - water, electricity, pipes, wires - houses built 300-400 years ago and we here don't manage with "younger" houses, up to a hundred years old. The subject of this post is a 300-year-old log cabin in the Beskedy Mountains Nature Reserve in the Czech Republic that has been converted by its owners into a rustic-style vacation home.

The Beskedy Mountains are part of the Carpathian Mountains that run through Central and Eastern Europe. They belong to Moravia and Silesia in the eastern Czech Republic and have been a protected area since 1973, the largest protected area in the Czech Republic, covering 1160 sq km. It is of exceptional natural value due to the still existing virgin forests and the rare species of Carpathian flora and fauna that have survived.

The cottage is called Tara and it has about 140 livable square meters. It has taken the owners 5 years to transform the old wooden house into a beautiful vacation home with 6 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, kitchen, dining room, terrace and wine cellar. Everything was done with great care, with minimal influence on the exterior and interior walls. The roof has been reroofed exactly as it was originally done, with hand hewn shingles.

The centerpiece of the house is the old stove in the dining room, which has a bread oven, a stove for cooking and a place to sleep. To get to the sleeping place you climb 3-4 steps, with the bed on top. This way, the warmth comes from below and you sleep wonderfully.

I remember when I was a little girl they used to make ovens like this in our house, with a place where you could sleep. Do such ovens still exist?

The kitchen, also on the ground floor, has kept the old stove, but an electric one has been added, although the two are very similar. The rustic look of the kitchen is complemented by the wooden cupboards, rugs of all kinds and other objects that fit in perfectly with the overall look of the kitchen.

The dining room has 2 large dining tables with benches on either side and a generous sofa next to which is an old sewing machine used as a coffee table.

Every space is fully utilized, so there's also a secluded seating area, like a small booth by the window, with weathered benches and where you can see the old tree trunks that make up the walls.

On the ground floor there is a large and 2 small bedrooms. The 2 bedrooms are real gems. Small, austere, decorated like old servants' rooms, with narrow single beds, high wooden bedside tables, a chair as bedside table and 1-2 old objects (stove, pitchfork) like sets from old English movies.

Under the staircase going upstairs there is a sofa and a seating area with a mini library, TV and DVD player. You wouldn't believe that all this equipment can find its place in all that old decor with the wooden walls blackened by time and smoke.

Upstairs are 3 more bedrooms and a discreet place to read or simply relax.

There are exposed beams everywhere, combined with the whitewashed wall. Everything has been preserved, even the ruins of the old chimney.

The furnishings are carefully chosen, there are many charming antiques, as is the little baby swing.

All the wood has a rustic, natural and patinated look, with no sheen or other improper and inappropriate finishes in an old wooden house.

In the basement was the wine cellar. The stone arches and walls have been left exactly as they were made 300 years ago. Above the entrance to the wine cellar, a beautiful porch with a wooden fretwork fence, carved to form little hearts, stretches the full width of the house. It is a wonderful place to admire the surrounding nature without the eye encountering other buildings.

About rustic look of furniture or houses I've told you about it on several occasions, but I couldn't seem to find the best example to illustrate it. This old wooden house in the Czech Republic, now a vacation home, is exactly the idea of rustic: simple, straight lines, wood inlays reminiscent of nature, no sheen and no thick layers of varnish, wood combined with elements that lead to the same idea (rugs, carpets, simple curtains).

A log cabin, restored with respect for wood, history, nature and ancestors.

source: grove-cottages.co.uk