T H E I N S P I R A T I O N F O R my first book was a childhood family road trip in 1959 from California to Colorado. Not long after Camps and Cottages was published, I asked my husband, a native upstate New Yorker, what he thought of the idea of searching out old cottages and new styles by visiting some of the areas where he had grown up. I was born and raised in the greater Los Angeles area and had maintained many of the same friendships from grade school through college. My husband's childhood was radically different. He had grown up as a "company brat," and as his dad worked his way up the company ladder, it meant moving from city to city. I knew that a few of the East Coast locations might bear an interesting variety of cottage styles-from upstate New York to Philadelphia and Washington-and though the trip would be whirlwind, it would give this Californian a chance to temper "book-taught" perceptions with firsthand doses of reality. Excerpted from Vintage Cottages by Molly Hyde English All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
