A Scottish fisherman's cabin becomes a charming retreat for a creative couple
The final clifftop sprint to Edinburgh of the London North East railway tracks the most dramatic coastline in the British Isles. Way below, the restless North Sea tosses against black basalt ridges thrown up in the Ice Age to furrow shingled coves.
A stumbling, steeply sloping cliff top path culminates on the beach in a rock cut tunnel. In the blinding flash of light at the end of this tunnel when the sun hits the water, the Blue Cabin ahead beckons. Set above the tideline the cabin has panoramic views of the sea and the boats coming in, the rockpools and the beach. A barrow along the track is the only way to bring provisions. This is no Ocado country.
Built at the turn of the nineteenth century, the Blue Cabin was always a holiday house. When Edinburgh based architect Ben Tindall with his wife, the sculptor Jill Watson, bought the property in 2009 it was white, and shuttered so they painted it blue. Just don’t call it Yves Klein blue, too precious by half. He used a standard boat paint, International Danube to be precise.
Inside, paint colours are inspired by echoes of distemper seen in nearby derelict fisherman’s cottages, modified to suit the light which constantly changes, weathering storms and sunlit days, and the tides. “Waves crash over the pier at all times of the year” Ben observes.
On the clifftop a small bronze sculpture, ‘Widow and Bairns’ by Jill Watson, records the fishing disaster of 1881 that ended Cove’s role as an important herring port on the east coast. Today some of its residents fishing for lobster and crab are descendants of the families lost in the disaster. Profits from the Blue Cabin holiday lets help to maintain and manage the harbor. There are no caravan parks or boring bungalows. Neither buildings nor people have intruded upon this coastal community,
Here Ben and Jill take time out from their busy international life based in Edinburgh where Ben’s architectural practice has for almost 40 years celebrated his succinct belief in “The Art and Craft of Architecture”. He designed the exquisite Queens Gallery in Holyrood. His most visited building is ‘The Hub’ for the annual Edinburgh Festival which Professor Youngson, former chairman at the Royal Fine Art Commission, says “banishes gloom and defies mediocrity to prove there is life in old Edinburgh yet.”
Jill, a figurative sculptor, carves marble and works in bronze for commissions from Scottish Opera, the Scottish Merchant Navy Memorial in Leith, the Clore Learning Centre in Hampton Court, and her works can be seen all over the world – Taipei, India, Italy, Hong Kong and the USA where she was a participant in the International Civil Rights Group show in the Rosa Parks museum in Alabama. She is currently casting seven bronze figures of the Mughal Emperor Humayun for the Aga Khan Trust for Culture in India.
Back home, having rearranged the floor plan of the Blue Cabin so that the living area has three windows and the galley kitchen is out of view, they added a shower room in the middle, two bedrooms to sleep four, bunk beds in one and the boxed-in bed. Hatches batten down in winter with insulation and double glazing, and underfloor heating in the shower. “After much debate, the Cabin was given all mod-cons, including wi-fi, a flat screen TV, even a dishwasher,” Ben says.
His love of authenticity shows in the robust furnishing. The cabin exhibits none of the sentiment of over decorated coastguard cottages. No anchors or ropes, ships in bottles or ornamental lighthouses, No bateau blue stripes. Rather, flowing forms of seaweed, with kelp and bladder wrack shaping cut-outs in the boxed-in bedrooms, and echoed in bronze hooks and handles designed by Jill who observes that “seaweed is like a garden plant which changes throughout the year.”
Navigational charts paper walls. Floors are planks of unfinished oak with the accompanying notice to tenants advising that “sand from the beach is welcome and can be easily swept up”. The beady eyed stuffed auk on a pedestal was rescued by Ben’s father from a skip. Paintings echo the bold brush strokes and intense colours of the post-Impressionist Glasgow Boys art movement of the 1920’s.
‘Masquerade’ damask silk curtains by Mulberry, willow pattern porcelain tiles lining the wood burning stove, a polished oak antique table with barley sugar legs and mahogany chairs are luxuries that make the interior chic rather than rustic. Two traditional Orkney chairs with woven backs and seats keep the warmth from the fire within their distinctive hooded backs.
As architects and artists, Ben and Jill are sensitive to the lives of the community at Cove and enjoy the company of the fishermen and their families. Ben was taught to make lobster pots and to smoke catches in wooden fish boxes. Jill was brought up on a farm. They have a small boat which they take out in the summer. Mid-summer means throwing a yellow oilskin over a table on the beach, anchoring it with small stones to crack freshly cooked crab claws, and serving samphire salads, soda bread and chilled white wine for their many friends.
benjamintindallarchitects.co.uk | jillwatsonstudio.co.uk | bluecabinbythesea.co.uk
Ben Tindall1/8The living area was reconfigured to have three windows and views out to the sea. The curtains are ‘Masquerade’ damask silk by Mulberry and a polished oak antique table with barley sugar legs and mahogany chairs are luxuries that make the interior chic rather than rustic.
Ben Tindall2/8
Ben Tindall3/8One bedroom features bunk beds.
Ben Tindall4/8The colours and forms are of seaweed, with kelp and bladder wrack shaping cut-outs in the boxed-in bedrooms.
Ben Tindall5/8Navigational charts paper walls across the cabin, as seen here in one of the bedrooms.
Ben Tindall6/8The other bedroom features the same green colour and cut out forms, with a boxed in double bed.
Ben Tindall7/8
Ben Tindall8/8
