An Arts and Crafts-style cottage on an East Sussex clifftop
The houses at Cliff End in East Sussex, a small enclave perched above the sea between Hastings and Rye, have that peculiar, sequestered quality occasionally afforded by a landscape. They sit comfortably in a slight hollow, each snugly enclosed by its own small ring of garden, with the ground continuing to rise behind them, providing some protection from the salty winds.
This scattering of houses was built by the architects Forbes & Tate between 1929 and the early 1930s as cottages in an Arts and Crafts style, designed with a similar aesthetic to nearby Great Dixter, using the same local reed bed to supply material for the thatched roofs. For some of the original buyers, these were intended as holiday homes, while for others they were family houses. It is testament to the appealing qualities of this particular example that it would not be put up for sale again for almost another 60 years.
In 1992, Lindsay Alker, a textile designer who worked in the fashion industry, and her partner Mario Rossi, an artist and senior lecturer at Central Saint Martins, were down from London visiting a friend in nearby Rye when they noticed a flyer for a property sale. With a baby on the way and tempted by the idea of living in the area, they decided to take a look.
Lindsay recalls seeing the cluster of cottages and being struck by the combination of dark timber and red brick, by low thatched roofs and tall, square chimneys. Once inside, she noted the red-brick fireplaces, parquet floors and doors with distinctive wooden Sussex latches. The place was not large, but the deep roof profile meant they were confident they would be able to expand it and, surrounded as it was by gardens, it felt like the right place to raise a family.
The couple were passionate fans of the Arts and Crafts movement and had already – almost unwittingly – acquired the basis of what would come to furnish this cottage. A few pieces of green-glazed Belgian Art Nouveau pottery – ‘We didn’t really know what it was at the time,’ says Lindsay – were beginning to form the core of a collection in their house in east London. They had also accumulated some early- 20th-century Mission furniture by American makers Stickley, as well as a set of 1920s Heal’s rush-seated dining chairs. Lindsay’s textiles often worked within this sort of aesthetic and she would later decorate the interior with wallpaper and fabrics featuring her own designs, including her faintly medieval linocut print of bounding stags, ‘Battle Great Wood’.
Following a series of delays, and a year spent living in New York when Mario received a Fulbright Award for visual art, work was able to begin on the house. But a transformation was not on the cards: the touch here was intentionally light.
Over the next 30 years, the property would be added to and adjusted as their work and family needs evolved. Mario, who studied sculpture at the Royal College of Art, began by creating a loft bedroom in the attic space below the roof – with the thatch staying on, apart from where he chainsawed through an area of it to make a new window. This allowed the original downstairs bedroom to be allocated to their older daughter Vita, who was then aged 10. Mario designed a garden studio for himself and, a few years later, he and Lindsay worked with Stiff + Trevillion architects on a rather more substantial intervention. An airy L-shaped extension now links the original garage with the rest of the house, forming a large room in the centre, which houses the kitchen, dining area and snug. This spot connects the busy kitchen to the garden. ‘Someone’s always cooking in there,’ says Lindsay. ‘When we moved out of London, the one thing we really missed was the food, so we learned to make curries, how to create dim sum...’ The garage was then converted, so it could serve as a bedroom for their daughter Stella, who is three years younger than Vita. As the family grew, the house expanded with them.
The thatched roof was abandoned in 2019. The reed bed that had originally supplied the thatch was no longer viable and maintaining this kind of roof felt increasingly impractical with the tendency towards hotter summers and wetter winters. The red clay Kent peg tiles that were chosen as a replacement actually feel more appropriate for the style and age of the cottage. The next building project coming up is a studio for Lindsay in the garden, designed by their eldest daughter Vita, who is an architect and co-founder of Studio Scampi.
The absence of a direct view of the sea, which is ‘only two or three minutes’ walk down a path anyway’, explains Lindsay, removes the temptation to introduce the glazed walls and giant windows that would dispel the sense of seclusion. The only concession to this is the French windows in the central extension, through which sunlight streams all evening.
A Stickley rocking chair, a piece they had owned for years, was positioned in front of the French windows and is now a favourite place to sit. Looking out from here, the eye is drawn to a fig tree, followed by beds of dahlias, echinaceas and tall grasses and, finally, your gaze rests on the white rose bushes flanking the garden gate. And so, after 30 years, with one adult daughter still living at home and the other a frequent visitor, this house is still much loved – and still growing.
Paul Massey1/9A Stickley rocking chair sits beside the window in the snug – with curtains in Lindsay’s ‘Casa’ – next to a table bearing Pennsylvanian punched-tin lanterns, Belgian vases and a vintage Habitat lamp. The still life is by Carlo Rossi.
Paul Massey2/9Fiery Crocosmia ‘Lucifer’ in a Belgian Art Nouveau jug enlivens an Arts and Crafts table bought at Lots Road Auctions and 1920s Heal’s rush chairs. The Finnish birch plywood floor is softened by the seagrass rug, which picks up on Mario’s painting Annex: IMO Circular #13, exploring small-boat migrant journeys across the channel.
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Paul Massey4/9In the sitting room, walls in Farrow & Ball’s ‘Studio Green’ and curtains in Lindsay’s ‘Saint Clement’ provide an atmospheric backdrop for an English Arts and Crafts table, brightened by a jug of Inula magnifica, and a Stickley side table with a Habitat lamp bought years ago. A kilim found in a local antique shop complements the original parquet floor
Paul Massey5/9In Lindsay's studio, her own ‘Battle Great Wood’ wallpaper in charcoal, a black and white print by Mike Nelson – titled Towards a Non-denominational Altar (from The Deliverance and The Patience, 2001/2009) – and an Ercol wooden armchair, which used to be in Mario’s father’s studio, inspire creativity in this inviting ground-floor room.
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Paul Massey7/9Walls painted in Dulux’s ‘Pure Brilliant White’ set off the antique Pennsylvania Dutch bedcover, a bench in Lindsay’s ‘Bohemia’ and a cushion in her ‘Nook Beach’ on a leather Arts and Crafts chair.
Paul Massey8/9A 1940s gilded rope-framed mirror, which came originally from a Cannes hotel, and a woven lampshade and rustic baskets add characterful touches to this pared-back space, which has its original door.
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