17/05/2026
How did you get where you are today?
Hi Im Jackie and together with my husband of 43 years, Steve, we own and run Newland Grove Cottages from our arable farm near Howden, East Yorkshire.
In 2019 we sort of hit a cross roads in our lives. Our 2 children were both adults with lives and families of their own and so it was time to focus on what our next chapter was? I'd previously worked in a variety of roles from Admin to Community Support and Steve had followed a family line of farming. To be honest we have always been “doing” kind of people never sitting down and chilling people, so we knew we needed another challenge. Life has thrown quite a few challenges our way over the years in various shapes and sizes.
So, when the opportunity arose for us to purchase a local farm we knew, here was our next challenge presenting itself. The farm was very very run down with every building needing demolishing and replacing and even the farm house needing LOTS of work. The plan looked like this...
Phase 1 – Tackle the house
Phase 2 - Demolish and rebuild all the surrounding buildings
Phase 3 – What to do with the old animal barns??
(Extra Phases that weren't in the initial plan - COVID, Wedding on the farm, total refurb/demolition of daughter's house)
Let me jump you forward to Phase 3 – The old animal housing. These consisted of 2 old brick buildings that to be honest also needed demolishing. But as we stood there inside them, looking up at the sky through the, what was once a roof ,we started hatching a plan. (Dreaming) You know when you walk into a place and you just get a “feeling”. Well that is how we felt about these 2 buildings. Were we crazy? According to our architect, yes totally ,but everyone needs a bit of crazy in their lives, right?
They were just in such a lovely location, surrounded by fields and nature. I blame part of my craziness from watching “Darling Buds of May” through rose coloured specs.
As with most builds the biggest and most stressful part was getting the local Planning Office to see our vision and stop fighting us as every turn and making decisions that kept putting the whole idea so far out of our reach. But we battled on and didn't give in.
We wanted the finish of the building to still look like it had always been there but obviously with the added bonus that it wasn't going to fall down and that it actually had footings.
We knew it was going to be a big job and lots and lots of hard work but we (or I) didn’t quite anticipate the thousands of bricks ahead of us that we needed to chip the cement off, stack and re-use. But as the saying goes “you can’t make a cake without breaking eggs :)
Slowly but surely with blood, sweat and tears and with a fabulous gang of builders (Jon Bovill) on site the vision started to appear. Whilst most of my friends would be out having their hair and nails done, I would be tiling a roof with Steve, climbing scaffolding or any of the what seemed like hundreds of jobs to be done.
We knew from the outset that we were planning on calling them Newland Grove Cottages as the farm is called Newland Grove but we wanted to give them their own independent names too. With a row of Lime Trees to the back view of one and a copper Beech Tree in front of the other – Lime Tree Cottage and Beech Tree Cottage were born.
Finally, with some hair still left on our heads that hadn't fallen out through the stress, in 2023 we had our first ever holiday cottages guests.
Were were so nervous. Would they like the cottages? had we got the cottages right? There was just so much behind the scenes admin stuff too to learn, that still keeps me on my toes 3 years later.
Our guests have been amazing. It blows my mind that they find little old us from all over the world. They have left us the most wonderful reviews and feedback. We continue to learn and grow every day.
To all our guests past and present and Hello if you haven't been yet are thinking of staying with us :) you are the best and are the reason we keep doing what we do. We love having you stay with us and we are so truly grateful to each and every one of you
Thank you and hopefully see you again soon
Jackie & Steve xx
