The Little House in London: our home story
Before the Little House in London
After meeting on Tinder in 2016 and living in separate house-shares in Balham and Kennington, we moved into our first rented flat together in Stockwell in 2018. It was a one-bed top floor flat in an old townhouse in a beautiful square that had recently been refurbished. Whilst we loved living there, the stairs were a killer, and we were keen to get on the property ladder if we could.
We started house-hunting in the autumn of 2019, scouting out different locations both in and out of London to see where we could afford to buy. We finally landed on Walthamstow, as it was still (relatively!) affordable for London back then, and had great transport links into the city centre (little did we know that would become a bit less important in a few short months!)
We viewed a few flats and small houses in different areas of Walthamstow - we knew we wanted a project that we could make our own and add value to, so the bones of the property, rather than the appearance were what was most important to us.
After work one dark evening in November, we turned up to a viewing at what would become our first home. The owners of the house showed us round and straight away we could see the potential. The house was liveable, which was a key criteria for us as we knew we would have to live in it whilst we renovated, but it had enough work that needed doing to it that we’d really be able to make it our own. A few days later, we were back in the morning before work for a second viewing, and this time, we put an offer in which was accepted that same day.
Fast-forward 3 months and we were packing up our flat in Stockwell, carrying A LOT of boxes and furniture down 4 flights of stairs and made the move across the river to north London.
Our renovation
Since moving in in early 2020, we’ve undertaken almost a full renovation of the house. Our first projects in year one included restoring the front of the house, which involved removing the pebbledash, tearing down the porch which was built over the top of a bay window, restoring the bay and brickwork and replacing the windows and front door. We also worked on turning the front bedroom back into one single room - when we moved in it had been a single bedroom which led through to another room (which had been used as a wardrobe by the previous owners once their children had left home). We tore down the wall and replastered with the aim of making this our master bedroom. Meanwhile, downstairs was all open plan except for a bathroom when we moved in, so we started putting up some walls to create an enclosed living room and separate hallway.
By the end of 2021, we were able to remortgage and use some of the equity in the house to undertake the next big stage of our project - the loft conversion. Doing the loft meant that we could get another bathroom upstairs, and eventually would mean we could remove the bathroom on the ground floor and open up the back of the house into a bigger kitchen diner. Work began on the loft in February 2022, and we added another bedroom on the top floor as well as an ensuite shower room. We also had the back bedroom on the first floor reconfigured to give us space for the landing and stairs leading up to the loft. We then divided the rest of the space into a smaller bedroom which was initially used as an office, but is now our little girl’s nursery, and another bathroom. Finally, to meet building regs, we also sectioned off some of the hallway from the kitchen area and this meant we gained a bit of a cloakroom space down the end of the narrow hallway.
Following a brief hiatus from reno works in September 2022 to get married and head off on our honeymoon around Italy, we came home to finally start work on the kitchen at the end of 2022. The old bathroom was removed, the kitchen was taken out, and the whole space was renovated into a bigger kitchen diner and snug. Work also begun on the garden in 2023, but most of our projects have taken a bit of a back seat, as we had our baby in September. But now we’re into the swing of being parents, we’ve finally finished off our hallway, the snug in our kitchen area and made some progress on the garden too.
Renovating our little home has not been without its challenges, not least making the most of the small space we do have and thinking creatively and practically about everything from the layout, to our design choices, to our furniture, to fit both our budget and the space we have available. Our aim with this blog is to go into the detail of how we’ve transformed our tired two-up, two-down traditional Victorian terrace into a functional family home, to normalise living in a small home, and to help you make the most of your small home too.