Welcome to Cool Faces, the first in a series of interviews featuring the people who own or run properties on Cool Places. Each month, we'll go behind the scenes somewhere different, be it a country house hotel, a foodie pub with rooms or a self-catering woodland cabin. This time around, we entered the wonderful world of John Tarrow, who spent 25 years creating the extraordinary Talliston House & Gardens in Great Dunmow, Essex.
Let's jump in...
Describe your property in 3 words.
To me, Talliston is a place beyond time, place and price. So, I guess three words would be:
Timeless. Stateless. Priceless.
Tell us your story – who are you, what were you doing before opening Talliston House & Gardens, and what inspired you?
On October 6th, 1990, I stepped into the house I could afford (a three-bedroomed, semi-detached, ex-council property in Essex) and started a personal journey that grew into a 25-year project: to take one of the UK's most ordinary homes and build all the houses I wanted to live in inside it.
It was a brave undertaking. I had no interior design or building experience – I couldn’t even wire a plug. But from a very early age, I’ve been a writer, so I did have one tool in my belt: imagination. Only through imagining can we ever hope to build a better world.
The process? To deconstruct each room back to the brickwork and rebuild from scratch. Upon completion, not one square centimetre of the original house remained (inside and out). Only using tradesmen who were essential for compliance with building regulations, the rest of the skills were learned by ordinary people – from carpentry, bricklaying and garden landscaping to more esoteric tasks like basket weaving, gold leafing and treehouse construction.
Once Talliston was finished, the first people to see it were The Times – they called it 'Britain’s most extraordinary home'.
What's been your greatest success?
Actually finishing the entire house and gardens in the first place. A quarter of a century is a long time to keep motivated.
But it didn’t start out as a massive grand design project. Rather, taking the smallest room and turning it into the perfect place to write (it’s now a 1929 detective’s office) was the main aim. But when people saw the finished space, the idea to transform more rooms, and finally the entire house, began to take shape.
I set a deadline of 25 years – the life of the mortgage – and just kept going until it was finished. I worked with 138 artisans, artists and tradesmen and travelled to 42 countries to bring back 200+ items and keep everything authentic.
What's been your greatest challenge?
The biggest challenge was getting others to see the vision – when you present people with a magnolia room with a 70s brown carpet and tell them to imagine a 13th-century tower taken over by the Victorians for a midwinter retreat in December 1887, you get a lot of blank stares. I was told several times that what I imagined was impossible, but isn’t everything until someone achieves it?
When the way ahead wasn't clear or I ran out of money, things were put on hold until a solution or cash became available. Unlike most B&Bs, I wasn’t looking for a return on investment. In effect, Talliston was my child – it had all my spare time and money – and it's now very rewarding to share the space with respectful guests.
What's your favourite room or feature of Talliston House & Gardens?
That’s a bit like asking a parent to choose their favourite child! All the rooms are my favourites. Talliston has spots for your perfect breakfast, quiet meditation, study, writing and more. But if I had to choose, the place I gravitate to most is the first room I transformed: the 1920s New York office. Conceived as my perfect place to write, I’ve penned four published novels at the rolltop desk. The first was a fantasy novel called The Stranger’s Guide To Talliston, fictionalising the tour, and the fifth – 'The Stranger’s Key To Talliston' – due out in September 2024.
Tell us about the stories you've woven around the property.
Being an author, the only way I could approach the rooms was to write them, conceiving the interiors as chapters in a book. I did the same research I would for any piece of fiction: created characters and visited properties to inspire the look and feel of the unique spaces. These imagined histories and places became the blueprints for the finished rooms.
On the tours I give of Talliston, I find myself saying, 'I didn’t create this for you!' These are personal visions of houses I would have loved to live in. That guests inhabit and fall in love with the details and richness of the environments is exactly the same as readers connecting with the stories in my books. Unlike other B&Bs, guests who book any of our three rooms have access to the main house to explore – and there’s lots to discover.
What's the strangest request you've had from a guest?
The Master Bedroom is decorated in Scottish Art Nouveau style, recreating the bed chamber of a seven-year-old Edwardian child complete with books, toys and ephemera. The experience was so real for one guest, they asked if they could contact the boy using a Ouija board they found behind the wardrobe.
What's special about your location?
Great Dunmow is a hidden East Anglian gem – close to London and Stansted Airport, yet a world apart with its original medieval layout and streets full of independent shops and markets. There's also the unique Dunmow Flitch, when the town re-enacts a 900-year-old trial to award a side of bacon to married couples who satisfy the judge and jury that they have 'not wisht themselves unmarried again'.
Essex gets a bad rep, but it's actually a beautiful and diverse county filled with history and heritage – the perfect place for Talliston, marrying its working-class roots with grand and aspirational designs.
What's your local hidden gem that guests should check out?
The catering for our afternoon teas, suppers and events is handmade every day at Meadow Hill Coffee Shop & Deli. The owner – Carole Sansom – and crew are simply the best cooks. They have even added traditional sandwiches – like cucumber and egg and cress – to their menu to accommodate our teas set in the Victorian era. Pop in for a coffee or to eat – their sharing boards are a treat!
What does the future hold for Talliston House & Gardens?
The eventual aim is to put the property into a trust, securing its future forever. Like every hotel or B&B business, lockdown was a very difficult time – we survived by opening an online shop selling antiques and handmade crafts (Messrs. Weird & Wonderful) and appealing to our followers for help. While the pandemic delayed things, we’re back on track to celebrate our 10th anniversary of opening in 2025 (or 35 years since starting!), with announcements of my non-fiction book about the journey to build Talliston, as well as finally creating that trust.
Take a look at Talliston House & Gardens for more info, and keep your eye out for the next instalment of Cool Faces.
For more unique accommodation options, check out our unusual places to stay guide.
