Colin and Justin’s cabin love
Intrepid Scottish designers turn loose their expertise on a Haliburton cottage
Scottish design duo Colin McAllister and Justin Ryan rose to fame in the U.K. with hit property-flipping and decorating programs, but they’ve now landed firmly in Canadian cottage country with their show Cabin Pressure.
In the first season, they bought a Muskoka, Ont., cottage with friends and flipped it, using the profits to purchase a personal Haliburton, Ont., property they renovated during Season 2.
The third season, premiering Sunday on Cottage Life network, sees them start all over again on a new Haliburton cottage they intend to rent out and have christened “Plan B.”
As cottage season slowly approaches, the Star sat down with the pair to get a sneak peek and some tips for sprucing up your own little home away from home. You’re both from Scotland, did you ever have anything like a cottage growing up?
Justin: The whole notion of cottaging was just very new to us but we fell in love with it very quickly. A lot of people have got a tendril, just something that relates to cottaging and it’s lovely. It’s a great place to decompress. The weekend fixes Canadians. You’ve done high-end renos around the world, what is it about cottages that keeps you coming back?
Colin: They’re emotional. I think there’s a resonance in all things cottagey in Canada, because it is so beloved and everyone’s got great stories about going up to the lake. That was a big transition for us. Suddenly we had a new vocabulary that was about us sitting at 2 a.m. in the darkness looking at the stars, talking a load of nonsense in the silence and making echo noises. There’s a purity there. Season 3’s Haliburton cottage, which you call “Plan B” and intend as a rental property, is the third one you’ve renovated for the show. What were the toughest challenges?
Justin: We really bought a wolf in sheep’s clothing because it felt like a fixable cabin. We bought it and we obviously had surveys done and we kind of considered all the merits and indeed the demerits, but until you take something apart you can never properly understand the devil that lies beyond. It really was just unbelievably rotted.
It’s been completely a labour of love and a joy to see. We always use the words house whisperers, we can tell what a house needs and where it needs to go. We can just listen for the signals.
When we got that cottage, it was kind of a rundown, flatlined little cabin, but we were able to paddle it back to life like George Clooney from ER. What tips do you have for people wanting to renovate cottages on a small budget?
Colin: If you’re on a limited budget then you have to be extra smart, and it could be something as simple as swapping out a room. You move your living room into a bedroom, maybe you move it upstairs, you just change things around or change the orientation of a room as well.
(Also) having a purge. Getting rid of things that you have duplicates of, things that are worn, broken and things that you just hate. Then you may have a core of items left that we can then build on.
Justin: It’s really important as well to shop smart and shop clever in any environment, whether you’re decorating a condo, a townhome or a cottage.
But in the cottage environment, it’s ever more possible to find good stuff because there are so many consignment stores, so many second-hand stores, so many antique barns. We used old bicycles, which we paid 20 bucks for, and turned them into these really cool, stylized stag heads. You’ll see them in part of the show. Before any of that, the most important thing is planning; to fail to plan is to plan to fail.
Unless you can conceptualize a vision it will all just become woolly.
Colin: In cottage country, we’re not going out there and putting horns on everything and big moose-y cushions and all this — we’re trying to update people’s references and it’s all about the connection.
Justin: We try where we possibly can to use artisans and crafters and makers. There’s a growing company — they’re called Rebarn — they make incredible barns doors. If you have one thing that’s so stereotypically rural and rustic and gorgeous, then that’s your anchor for everything else. How would you define cottage style?
Colin: I think we’ve been able to kind of plunder though that. When we first came to Canada, we were a bit mystified as to the whole Canadiana thing. And we’ve grown to love it.
It’s always good to have humour in design as well and I think the cottage is the perfect place for that because you want people to be relaxed.
Justin: I think it’s also really important to allow yourself a little whimsy in your design, because if you’re too serious about everything your project will feel too hard-edged. This interview has been condensed and edited.