A Traditional Cottage Industry From Yorkshire
Holly Cottage Farm is a family run business which started trading in April 2012.
The main ethos behind Holly Cottage Farm is traditional and local. We try to source locally where possible and do as much as we can ourselves.
For full details of products available and prices please see the further pages, contact us or visit our tearoom .
Our tea room and nursery are stocked with our own hand made products from our workshop. To add to this we also stock a few handmade products from a few specially selected local crafers. Outside there is also a range of mainly perennials and shrubs for sale, propagated and grown on our own plant nursery.
We also have events at the tea room, along with small private parties our ticketed events are held throughout the year. In summer and December we hold our semi-outdoor events at the tea room at Holly Cottage Farm, in spring and October we hold Rock 'n' Roll nights at the local Village Hall. All our music is performed by Stood On The Wire our own 50's and 60's Rock 'n' Roll Duo. Andrew is Lead guitarist and vocalist for the duo. on our summer nights there is often other songs incorporated with the Rock 'n' Roll and some slower numbers while the guests are dining. All our events have a licensed bar and at Holly Cottage Farm there is food included. We put a tremendous amount of effort into all our event to give you a unique experience, from food and music to decoration to create the right environment.
Our Journey
We started by doing craft fairs and agricultural shows selling our own grown plants, wooden products such as bird and owl boxes made in our workshop, our own printed greetings cards and Petra's home made jams and chutneys. Andrew also started as a self employed handyman and gardener, with the main aim to develop into just gardening.
We slowly developed our award winning show stand, and ventured into a small summer house shop and plant sales at Holly Cottage Farm.
In 2018 we decided we would like to open a tea room, which happened to coincide with a job for a client where Andrew was requested to remove a large wooden office/summerhouse from a garden and dispose of. This was of course a great oportunity which we seized. Petra had always dreamed of running a tea room, so Andrew rebuilt it at Holly Cottage Farm and fitted it out. as a small tea room, The Talking Teapot tiny tea room was born, opening in July 2019. Unfortunately we were then hit with Covid and so closed in 2020. However we did re-open as soon as we could and it continues to thrive today. We then stopped the fairs and shows due to the rising costs involved and to concentrate on the Tea Room and Plant Nursery.
The Tea Room continued to develop and slowly covered outside areas were built with heaters for more customers. It was suggested that evening events could be held and after some thought and preparations the first event was held and very successfull. This however gave Andrew a reason to get his guitars out again and try and form a duo, as he did have reasonable success as a lead guitarist when he was younger, for details please visit his website Stood On The Wire.
During the following 2 years we held a number of dining events with Stood On The Wire providing the music.
At shows and craft fairs we always liked to look the part.
History
Andrew, a former mechanical and electrical building services engineer and then manager, had always been passionate about gardening and carpentry. Gardening had been a passion and interest since childhood, taught by his grandfather who served a gardening apprenticeship at Hovingham Hall. There were also other members of the family connected with horticulture who gave much guidance over the years. The same applies to carpentry having had a great uncle who had taught him many basics as a child, then continually learning from other family members through the years, not to mention working with some very good joiners on the tools and as a manager.
Petra had always done a bit of baking and helped with preparing food for parties, but when she left school she started in the kitchens of a local supermarket on saturdays and became more and more involved with the cooking. Unfortunately the kitchens were closed years later to save money, but until recently she was still with the same company for over 25 years, having also had other occupations at the same time. Petra took to country life like a duck to water and when she had some strawberries left, had her first go at jam. The jam was a hit and the process was to be the start of something for the future.
In 2008 they moved into Holly Cottage, a former farm house in the middle of Tollerton. Whilst Andrew had spent a lot of time in the countryside with family growing up, this was his dream to have their own country cottage. It wasn't long before he set to work in the garden, one day digging up the old sign for Holly Cottage Farm, this then became the name for their pipe dream. In April 2012 after Andrew was diagnosed with a chronic illness and made redundant, he was now unable to work a full time job, they decided this was the time to try their pipe dream, it was now or never. Andrew and Petra started Holly Cottage Farm and have never looked back, this included a handyman and gardening service, this became busier and busier and led to employing the services of another handyman, it is now predominently a high quiality gardening service.
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