Wealden Times | WT179 | January 2017 | Health & Beauty supplement inside

Above: Ally has rationalised and organised each of her children’s rooms with her own distinctive design techniques – including more
chalet-style horizontal boards and clever storage spaces – while allowing the children’s own taste and style to shine through
This thoughtful mother has also designed the most
incredible den for her children and their friends, upstairs
in the former hop-processing shed across the lawn. All
reclaimed materials and ‘industrial chic’ the space is leagues
above your average playroom and perfect for teenagers.
The den’s walls are covered in corrugated iron, which
were retrieved from various local farmyards, or reclaimed
scaffold boards, and a tractor tyre has been topped with
planks and turned into a table. Distractions include a
drum kit, pool table, dart board and a flat-screen TV –
of course. Best of all, the blinds – which look like old
hop pockets – are made from hessian grain sacks.
Downstairs, reached via French doors which face out on to
the garden and the same enviable views, is Ally’s office and
work room. Not what you might expect to find in a barn, the
room is filled with luscious fabric samples, wallpaper books
and haberdasher’s goodies. Thick, sisal-type carpet, as found
throughout the house, adds to the rustic charm. It is from
this room that she plans her interior design schemes... one
of the most striking of which is also just across the lawn.
Converted oasts, in Kent and Sussex at least, are
commonplace. This conversion, completed twelve years
ago and used by the Wylies as guest accommodation, is
also a holiday let – and is ‘something else’. Also reached
by an outside staircase, once inside the oast you’re met
with the most gorgeous open-plan kitchen and living
room, lined with pale-blue painted boards and honeycoloured
beams. A wood-burner adds to the cosiness.
The kitchen area comes with a butler sink and huge,
chunky butcher’s block, complementing a country-style
table and cream-painted dresser that is home to an array
of blue and white willow-pattern crockery. Overhead,
stencilled black numbers on the beams are a reminder
of the oast’s former purpose... if the hop gardens visible
from the windows aren’t enough of a reminder.
Behind the living and eating area, the three roundels of
73 wealdentimes.co.uk