renovation | A Castle in the Sky

July 16, 2013
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Adding up radiators (Jul 16)

We have a mishmash of radiators here and as part of our heating overhaul we’ve worked out that some of them (all the ones from the 50’s) have either no impact because they’re not big enough or they’re rusty and leaking. We need to replace just over a dozen.

However the handful of Victorian cast iron ‘column’ radiators we have, work well and look lovely. So our plan is to get more – as cheaply as possible.

Working out what sizes we need has involved a mind-blowing set of sums; I’ve had to work out the heat output (in kilowatts) we need in each room based on the room’s dimensions. I’ve then had to deduct the heat supplied by any existing radiators to establish what’s missing. All my kilowatt figures then have to be converted to old fashioned BTU’s – as this how the heat output is measured in old cast iron radiators. Once I know what heat output I need I then have to find the right size of radiator with the right dimensions so that it will fit into the space (often under a window). At this point my eyes are squinting as there’s a number of options depending on how the columns in each radiator are arranged – from tall and thin to short and fat…Much like the 2 different plumbers who reneged on doing the calculations for me.

It’s all going to be worth it though as I’ve worked out that reconditioned salvage is going to cost us at least half the price of new (a whole other set of calculations) – and hunting around for them is obviously much more fun.

So I’ve been scouring ebay, gumtree and the local flea markets and I even found a farmer nearby who sells stuff that’s been thrown out of old farmhouses. I’ve found 4 on our list this way. But the most obvious place is salvage yards and as there are two near here we headed over today with my copious notes in hand.

Several hours later and I’d ticked off another 8. So we’re nearly there. They will all need to be sent off to be pressure tested, sandblasted and painted (colour still to choose) and given that this is a 6 week turn around (with a round trip to Edinburgh) they should arrive in time to coincide with the installation of the new boiler…

Surely this can’t all go to plan….

June 12, 2013
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To do lists…(Jun 12)

I do love a to do list – and as the list for this house will keep me going for the next 20 years I couldn’t be happier. Today’s list is:

Chase plumber for breakdown of costs for new hot water system

Book in insulation man

Get carpenter to fix leaking window

Pay locksmith

Sign contract for septic tanks

Get in planning applications for new biomass heating system

Apply for a building warrant

Price up wood pellets

Book in Green Deal Assessor

Research salvage cast iron radiators

But then Ed ran through his list with me and now I’ve got list envy….

Move oak tree from orchard

Cut the paths through the paddock

Cut back the rhododendron’s around lawn

Plant magnolia

Research compost toilet

Build sheds

Cut holly

Research yurts

Clear riverbanks

Scarify and aerate lawn

Dig drains

Weed control

April 25, 2013
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My first mistake…(Apr 25)

We’ve got a ridiculously small kitchen for such a big house. It’s on the first floor in what we’re told used to be the butler’s pantry and our long-term plan is to put it back where it originally was. It’s an ongoing discussion as the old kitchen (just an empty room) is on the ground floor quite separate from the rest of the house (just like a servants kitchen ought to have been) but it’s not necessarily the obvious place to put a kitchen now.

Our instincts say it will make sense of the ground floor plan as the rooms down there might otherwise be a bit defunct and there are other advantages to having it where it used to be, like a huge bricked up old fireplace that we’ve yet to take a sledgehammer to (one for next year) – and a flagstone floor underneath an old carpet. The flags are in a bit of a mess – dirty and flaking and mostly covered in what looks like carpet glue but no obvious damp patches.

As we don’t really know what to do with them I’ve spent ages trying to find someone to come and give us a bit of advice. Apparently good stone masons are hard to come by and when I did manage to get hold of someone he said the only way to get rid of the glue was sanding – so he came today to do one of the flags with a machine.

But it wasn’t a good idea; what was a mottled dirty old flag now looks like a plain flat slab of grey concrete.

I feel bad about it and hope we can find a less drastic alternative.

It’s a strange thing taking on this house. We both feel there’s some history here that we want to look after or reinstate if we can. It’s not that we need to be conservationists exactly – but just that we need to take care.

So I’m having to reign in my tendencies just to get things done – we’ve taken on a massive project and sometimes finding the right solution is just going to take a while to work out.

April 7, 2013
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Preparing for next winter…(Apr 7)

We knew before we bought the house that we’d like to be as green and energy efficient as possible here, despite the fact that the house is so big.

The oil boiler’s been first on our list to try and replace. It’s taken a few weeks of research but I’m now an expert on renewable energy – and could bore you to death with my knowledge of biomass and geo-therm, hydropower and heat pumps. We’d imagined wind turbines, solar panels and ground source might all be options – but the thing that’s going to save us here is wood. Or more specifically wood pellets.

It’s a massive job – the installation is big and complicated – and includes a 2 storey high metal box or hopper (to store the pellets) as well as a boiler and 3 accumulator tanks (thermal heat stores) that will take up all the space in both of our out-houses. There’s a whole load of consents to get – listed building, planning and a building warrant – and we need to-scale drawings, diagrams, photographs and specs. We also need a shed-load of cash; the home improvement loan that we had earmarked for just some of the refurb’ is now all going to have to go on the heating.

The good news is that the government is providing incentives – and once the new system is in we can apply to recoup some of the money in installments across 20 years.

The even better news is that as wood is much cheaper than oil the new system should allow us to have the heating on whenever we need it throughout the winter months which is going to be a life saver.

Now I just need to make it happen before the cold weather returns.

April 2, 2013
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The cupboard under the stairs (Apr 2)

The cupboard under the stairs has turned out to be a treasure trove. Stored away in there we found an ancient fold up whicker garden chair with leather straps, a Master’s Voice gramophone and a set of bowls in a green felt-lined wooden box. All props that wouldn’t go amiss in a Downton Abbey garden party.

But the real treat is what’s on the walls – a block printed wall paper in a beautiful purple-blue….

I thought the leaves look like thistle leaves but I wasn’t sure about the blooms so deferred to my gardening expert friend Lou who’s christened them ‘dandy-thistles’.

I’ve since emailed some pics to The Wallpaper History Society and they told me that stair cupboards are great for wall paper discoveries ‘as they are often not stripped during re-decoration, and partly because they were sometimes papered in end rolls used in other parts of the house…’

It’s amazing to think the whole of the hall (or in fact any of the rooms) might have been covered in such a bold pattern. I’ve never used wallpaper before but the size of some of the spaces in this house is no doubt going to demand it. When we get to that stage of the refurb’ it’s going to feel like a big decision – so it’s lovely to find some original paper here for inspiration.

March 9, 2013
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Reality Check..(Mar 8)

It’s raining when we arrive (of course), miserably grey with a freezing cold wind that feels like a slap round the face as soon as we step out of the car. It’s only marginally warmer inside (we keep our coats, hats and scarves on all day) – a fact I try to ignore by focussing on where all the boxes should go and sorting out our beds.

The removal men are very taken with the place and keep stopping to take photographs. There’s no doubt that moving here is the stuff of fairy-tales but today all my romantic feelings are trumped by the reality of just how bitterly cold it is.

There’s a big woodburner in one of the rooms and the previous owners have left us a message telling us there’s plenty of logs. But when we eventually go to look for them there’s nothing in the shed, so we resort to the local garage who sell small bags for a fiver. They fill the burner (and the room) with grey smoke that stings our eyes – and when Ed chops one open with an axe, found in the empty shed, it’s soaked all the way through…

So we go to bed early, freezing cold and smelling of woodsmoke. Not quite the first night I’d imagined.

In the mayhem of all the half unpacked boxes I manage to find a set of very thick thermals. The last time I wore them was camping with Ed on the side of a mountain at extremely high altitude…