The cottages at Wallops Wood were designed to be as sustainable and eco-friendly as possible. Being in the heart of the South Downs National Park, building a sustainable business is very important to us. We’re surrounded by a beautiful environment with diverse nature and wildlife, so putting this at the forefront of our vision has helped ensure that we reduce our carbon footprint as much as possible, playing our part in helping to reduce climate change.
We are part of Britain’s Green Tourism Business Scheme and within the first month of opening, we won a Green Tourism Silver award. This was a really important milestone for us having been open for a very short time, so of course, our next goal was Gold! We achieved this in March 2020, having worked hard over the last few years to further improve our practices. Achieving this accolade means a lot to us and has further validated our efforts in creating a truly sustainable business.
Another Award in 2021
The beginning of 2021 saw us gain another award for our work towards making the cottages as sustainable as possible. This time we won Silver for the Ethical, Responsible and Sustainable Tourism Award at the Beautiful South Tourism Awards. Our Estate Maintenance Manager, Peter, also an Unsung Hero Award for his long and dedicated service at Wallops Wood.
These Awards have shown that with dedication to sustainability and the environment, you can create an eco-friendly business to be proud of!
The video below shows Andrew Graham, co-owner of Wallops Wood Cottages talk about Sustainable Tourism and how we’re playing our part at Wallops Wood.
You can view further videos from Andrew on our YouTube Channel.
Our Eco-Friendly Practices
Some of our eco-friendly practices include:
- Installation of solar panels on the roof of the north facing cottages to power all the cottages, the indoor swimming pool complex, the games / event room and our laundry facilities.
- Our borehole supplies our water. It is fed by the local aquifer and the water drawn from it is then UV treated to ensure our water is crystal clear.
- Installation of an electric car charger.
- Low energy lights that light all of our buildings.
- In the summer months the solar panels power our woodchip boiler which in turn heats the cottages, indoor pool and games room.
- Woodchips are sourced from our own woodland that is sustainably managed and is only a mile down the road.
- Owl boxes are placed around the cottages in the oak trees on the north side and we have an owl box above Silver Birch Cottage.
- Every year a wild meadow is sown with native flowers and grasses. Peter, our Estate Maintenance Manager, mows a path through it which allows our guests to enjoy butterflies and all kinds of insects which feast on the nectar.
- The surrounding fields, woodland and lanes of the cottages are ‘atweet’ with green finches, grey partridges, lapwings, goldfinches, skylarks and more. Our hedges are also full of sparrows, common blackbirds, chiff-chaffs, blue tits and bullfinches.
- We have plans to install a webcam for the barn owl box.
- We have installed a wildlife corridor; a hedging strip right across the front of the site which is good hunting territory for barn owls, and a nesting birds habitat.
You can find out more about our eco practices on our Green Ethos page.
