Charlie Ottley, the British who promoted Romania with the famous “Wild Carpathia” series, moved to us, in the village of Șirnea, in Brașov County. He bought an old house there and worked side by side with the craftsmen to repair it.
He now has all the facilities in a traditional home and urges others to do the same.
The old household in which Charlie Ottley now lives, on the hillside of Șirnea, has not lost its former charm, with the renovation works.
From the window, he and his girlfriend can admire the ridges of Craiului and the traditional houses scattered on the surrounding hills.
Charlie Ottley: “We have to show that these houses can be reused, all the furniture we have here we took and reused, we found second hand lamps, beds, everything, nothing is new, everything is old, ancient. I wanted it to be traditional and stylish, but also combined with modern technology. “
The journalist wants to change the way tourism is done in the area. He hopes to convince locals and investors to keep everything old and valuable.
Charlie Ottley: “The idea is that we can rent the place for a lot of money, a lot more money than if you had a typical concrete construction. Because foreign tourists want to stay in a place like this, they do not want to pay 120 lei for a room with a plastic shower, but would prefer to pay 100 euros and stay in a luxurious but traditional house “.
To make sure he set a good example, the Briton arranged his house with craftsmen from around the place.
Tiberiu Vălimăreanu, carpenter: “It was a new challenge, we had to respect everything exactly as it was once done, we had to work here, from the chainsaw and the utensils we had to make the furniture and everything that had to be done.”
Charlie wants to show business people that they can work from the top of the mountain, because they have high-speed internet here.
Charlie Ottley: “For us this is the headquarters, the office and I can’t wait to come here and work on new projects, we are now filming the Danube Delta and we want to rebrand the World Delta, like the Amazon of Europe, because it has never been promoted properly and it is such a precious and vital ecosystem. “
A family of teachers from Brașov bought the former post office in the village and came to Charlie to find out how they could rehabilitate it.
Madalina Constantin, owner of a traditional house: “They combined extraordinarily well, keeping the traditional elements, they also brought something modern, but without ruining the architecture of the area at all”.
Charlie plans to rebuild the old barn this spring and move there to receive tourists in the already repaired cottage.
