Hiya, My cottage is about the same age and I know exactly what you mean. First, I would check and see if it is structural. There is no point in doing all the work, then finding out that you are going to have to replace it in 5/10 years when it folds in on itself. I stripped the floors in one room and it was a massive job. Old floorboards have big gaps and mine had lots of old nails and other bits that I had to remove by hand one by one. Eventually I dark stained them and bought a carpet that leaves a 1m gap around the edges of the room, to give it the period feel, but cover up the not so good boards in the middle. After doing one bedroom, I have screwed Flooring boards (thick special chipboard) to the others. Made it level and reinforced, then bought a good underlay and carpet. To be honest, it looks and feels so much better, I wish I hadn`t bothered with trying to strip the floors in the other room. Please show us pics when it is finished :)

It looks like the simplest thing to do would be just add one bedroom (so 2 bed one bath). Keep the current bedroom and reception as they are. Knock down between kitchen and bathroom to make a large kitchen diner. Leave a small courtyard to allow for light for the bedroom, then behind this build another bedroom and bathroom, order depending on soil pipe access, but it would be nice to have the bathroom between the bedrooms and master bedroom at the back overlooking garden if possible...

Hi Vicki, I would go for bigger tiles, ones that are 60 cm x 30 cm. If you use smaller tiles the outcome may look too busy with your chosen floor tiles. I also suggest choosing very light grey wall tiles, the colour of which matches to the grey background colour of the floor tiles. That would give you the industrial sort of vibe you are aiming to achive. Order different samples and see how the combinations look in your bathroom. The colours can change dramatically depending on the lighting. Kati

If you have large gaps between the boards then we did find this product in the UK (can’t remember the name though sorry!) that was a tape in a V shape you squeezed together into the gap then it expanded out to hold in place. It’s designed to stop drafts but could work at stopping water from escaping as well. Otherwise there’s the original trick of mixing sawdust from your boards with pva and pushing this between the boards. Few coats of the boat varnish as mentioned might just fill in any small gaps though so it’s only an issue for deep ones.