Life has changed. Peace and contentment has fallen over My Friend’s House Towers. Even the cat seems better disposed towards me. Why? Because I had a stove fitted, of course. Yes, we can sit in the house without our coats on! Yes, we can spend hours debating which log is most dry and fire-ready (they call me The Log Whisperer)! Yes, the cat finally respects me.*

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Ready for a big sleep?

Not in a Mafia-type way. I just mean, are you suffering from pre-Christmas fatigue as badly as we are? It’s been such a busy year for My Friend’s House, and today we’re looking forward to our Christmas lunch with the other people from our new office. We’re going to take a break now, back on […]

Writer in residence

Get out of that garret, you writer. They’re offering whole houses for the likes of you in Detroit. The organization Write A House, a group of writers, activists and artists in Detroit, is rennovating homes in the city, teaching young people trade skills in the process. But get this, they are also inviting writers to […]

Shifting the furniture

Yesterday I interviewed a housekeeper with the National Trust for a newspaper (I’ll shout you when the feature is out). I asked her if there was one thing she’d learnt from looking after a large stately home that she now applied to her own house? I thought she might come up with something esoteric about […]

Posters of iconic movie homes

When I was about 14 my parents took me on a three-week holiday around parts of California and Canada, much to the continual annoyance of my older brothers who’d been brought up on holidays in Gairloch (google it, Sausalito it is not). Anyway, I remember being driven around fancy parts of LA by family friends who […]