‘The Crooked House’ owners invite Attitude inside their 14th-century home in Lavenham, Suffolk (EXCLUSIVE)
After falling in love at first sight online during lockdown, now-husbands Alex and Oli Khalil-Martin fell hard for a 14th-century home affectionately known as “The Crooked House” in Lavenham, Suffolk. Here, Alex shares their story…
Oli and I met online during the Covid pandemic in May 2020.
As lockdown rules prevented us from meeting in person, our first date was a video date. We chatted for hours and quickly realised we were perfectly matched – sharing the same values and interests, including a love of history, entertaining and interiors.
It was love at first sight. When the call ended after our first video date, Oli ran to his housemate, saying, “I’ve just met my husband!” Who could have believed that just over a year and a half later, in December 2021, we’d be getting married, here in our dream home?
Living the fairytale
I first saw the house during a visit to Lavenham, Suffolk, in 2018. I fell in love with it right away. It went up for sale in January 2020, but I didn’t feel like the timing was right to leave my job and London. When I met Oli, I shared my dream of buying The Crooked House; it was an easy sell. We’re both so similar that any dream I had was also going to be shared by Oli. But we were disappointed to find it was under offer with another buyer. Then, when that offer fell through, we moved quickly and put an offer in. “They’ve accepted your offer” – we’ll never forget those words, when our life began and the fairytale came true. We’d only known each other a few months before we bought The Crooked House together – but when you know, you know. We moved to Lavenham in early 2021.
A home with heritage
“The Crooked House” in Lavenham, Suffolk (Image: James McDonald)
The Crooked House is a small house with a big history. It was built in 1395, as part of a wealthy wool merchant’s house, when Lavenham was becoming England’s richest wool town. It is said to have inspired the nursery rhyme There Was a Crooked Man. When the wool trade collapsed in the late 16th century, the house was divided into terraces, with the residents of The Crooked House enduring years of poverty. It was during this time that poverty, plague and politics stirred up some of England’s worst “witch-hunting”, with many innocent local women accused of and executed for witchcraft. We’ve discovered two “witch marks” in the house from this dark chapter. They’re superstitious symbols that were carved into the beams over 300 years ago, providing a fascinating glimpse into the minds and beliefs of the people who lived here then. The ones we have show two Vs, which stand for “Virgin of Virgins,” a call to the Virgin Mary to protect the house from evil.
Although The Crooked House is Grade II listed, it was a surprisingly straightforward purchase. As Britain’s best-preserved medieval village, Lavenham has over 300 listed buildings and an army of skilled local surveyors and craftspeople, all accustomed to dealing with ancient houses. Our structural survey found The Crooked House to be four times stronger than required by modern commercial building regulations, due to the size of its oak timbers. We’ve been told we’ve got the best wood in Lavenham!
Most interior decoration is permitted, as long as it doesn’t impact the original fabric of the building. More significant renovation rightly needs very careful planning. We always have The Crooked House’s best interests at heart and have built a very positive relationship with our local heritage office. In fact, we’re about to start a big restoration project on the back of the house, which is currently covered in damaging 20th-century concrete render. The render is trapping moisture behind it, rotting the house’s timber frame, and needs to be removed and replaced with traditional lime plaster. We’ve spent the past five years raising the funds for this project and can’t wait to see The Crooked House restored and protected for the future.
Not “the only gays in the village”
There were always going to be nerves, moving to a small rural community and wondering whether we’d be accepted as a gay couple. However, when we spotted that we were buying The Crooked House from “Mrs and Mrs”, we were somewhat reassured. Since moving here, we’ve found Lavenham to be a wonderfully welcoming place and we certainly aren’t “the only gays in the village”. After all, Lavenham is full of beautiful historic houses mostly unsuitable for families with children… You can see why we all love it here.
Before our transformation into full-time, self-styled “Crooked Men”, we unfortunately had rather more normal lives. Oli grew up in Cambridge, and I am from Birmingham. We both moved to London after university. There, Oli went into financial services while I had a career in PR and marketing. Thankfully, we’ve now been able to “step out of the ordinary” – to quote Heather Small – and live our dream lives as two Crooked Men, dedicated to sharing the story of The Crooked House with everyone.
This is an excerpt of a feature appearing in Attitude’s November/December 2026 issue.