Food For Thought

Cookery writer Tori Finch missed out on her dream home only to fall in love all over again once she transformed an unsavoury building into a welcomingsanctuary

- Mandi Millar

The road to Tori Finch’s dream home was not an easy one to navigate. She and her husband, Ross, had several near misses before they unearthed an unloved cottage in West Sussex and then spent years planning its redesign.

Tori and Ross discovered the cottage after losing out on a country house they had hoped to buy. ‘We were gazumped, so we didn’t know if we’d move at all at that stage – and when I first saw this place, I really disliked it,’ admits Tori. ‘It was in a total state, but I could see potential. So we decided to go ahead, renovate and then sell it, with the aim of moving to a property in the country.’