The heart RULES

A SOCIABLE LAYOUT AND INVITING COLOUR SCHEME ENSURE TRUDI AND JIM REID’S KITCHEN IS THE HUB OF THEIR NEW COUNTRY HOME

- LINDA CLAYTON

While her husband’s house-hunting focus lay firmly on the proximity of his favourite golf courses, Trudi Reid was seeking something that can’t be found on any map. ‘I was heavily pregnant with twins when we first viewed the house, and I got that “feeling” the moment I walked in,’ she recalls. ‘I could really see us living there – it felt like the house was already ours.’

Known in estate agency circles as ‘buying with the heart rather than the head’, Trudi’s instincts certainly weren’t based on the condition of the property which, while classically beautiful with a sense of grandeur, hadn’t been fully modernised since it was built in 1919. ‘The kitchen was a muddle of small rooms and would have only been used by the servants. There was even an outdoor boiler house with an ancient cast-iron coal boiler,’ Trudi says.

Completing the purchase in the same week the twins were born proved pretty crazy, but the couple barely took a breath before knocking through the small kitchen rooms and extending. ‘Our aim was to create one seriously spacious kitchen-diner and TV area with bi-folding doors overlooking the garden,’ says Trudi. ‘We also wanted a separate boot room/laundry space, as we’re deep enough in the country to need a proper pair of wellies.’