After spotting Cassie’s vintage Alpine Sprite in a recent issue of Caravan magazine we wanted to know more, and asked her to share details of this renovation project. Have a look at her before and after photos below and read how she turned a crumbling damp trailer into a cosy home office.

How it began

The idea to use an old caravan as my home office came about after I moved into a one-bedroom home. As a full-time writer and blogger I needed an office space so that I could work uninterrupted, and a creative space where I could take photographs of sewing and craft projects. I spotted a shabby old caravan for sale in my local town and, despite the peeling paint and musty smell, I could imagine how lovely the curved Sprite caravan would look if it were painted so I decided to go for it.

Even though the caravan was in a terrible state I intended to keep my budget as low as possible by reusing as much of the old caravan as I could. Most of the interior was damp, but luckily the seats could be salvaged, along with the original table – so at least I had somewhere I could sit and work!

Materials

The only paint I invested in was the blue exterior paint. I chose a bright sky-blue shade from the Dulux range and had it made up as an exterior gloss, the type you’d use for painting front doors etc. I used a radiator roller to apply this to the exterior (once thoroughly cleaned and dry, of course) and it’s still holding up well after more than 3 years in the garden! I decorated the caravan interior with end-of-line tins of pastel paint that were reduced in the DIY store (which is why each wall is a different colour!) and asked friends to donate old wallpaper scraps to make a patchwork wall. The result is definitely unique, and I can keep adding to the design when I find interesting patterns or pieces of craft paper.

Thrifty hacks!

I reused the foam pads for the seats and my fabric was mostly thrifted too; the floral seat covers are my parents' old bed sheets! An off-cut of carpet has helped to keep the caravan warm when I'm working out there in cooler weather, and I've added desk lamps (and fairy lights, of course!) to illuminate my "office" in the evenings. For storage, I've used narrow pieces of furniture to give myself as much space as possible in the tiny caravan. I invested in a stacking storage system design for kids' bedrooms, which actually gives me more room to work and much more storage than the original interior did.

I now have a usable workspace in the garden AND it has become a spare room too; we can place the table between the seats and use the foam pads as a mattress, with a duvet and pillows stored inside the benches. I'm still working on a few more "traditional" updates for the caravan, such as adding a kitchen, overhauling the electrics and sorting out the tow-hitch, as we would quite like to get it on the road again and enjoy a "glamping" holiday!

A link to Cassie's blog can be found in the reference box below.

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