16th century cottage revamp

[kurt535]

Nick_MSM said:

Not a huge amount to report. Bathroom/landing ceilings painted and looks good. Fitted a new blind to the landing window.

Jobs to do in the coming months: new carpet on staircase/landing, finish gloss work in landing/doors upstairs (a lot of work). Strip and paint stair case spindle/hand rails in gloss white and light grey hand rails.

The next big job is to sort the driveway out, and I would appreciate some advice please. At present there is an old garage (sorting that is stage two and some way off) and a driveway for only one vehicle. We would like to excavate the current banks, and build new retaining walls further in to provide space for two vehicles. This will involve going the other side of the current hedges slightly and relocating the steps further back. At the moment soil is a foot high or so against one side of the garage so damp is an ongoing issue which needs sorting too.

See images below - obviously this is all subject to planning but we're looking into various options before approaching them. We like the look of gabion walls filled with possibly flint to emulate the walls on the property. There's easily enough space to dig out 4-5ft all round which *should* give us enough space. Also hoping to add a decent electric gate too for privacy. Is this something I can do with a friend and a mini digger or is there far more to think about? Don't want the garden collapsing etc!

for future proofing you could...

dig and lay a strip foundation say 600 by 600. block up to just below soil height then use brick to hide it both sides? would probably only lay 450-500mm a day and let it go off

[8-P]

Great looking place, any more updates?

[Nick_MSM]

tokyo_mb said:

Nick_MSM said:

On a different note, does anyone have any experience of beam stripping?

Have you looked on the Period Property forums? I am sure I have seen threads there on this topic (and they have huge collective experience of listed buildings) - just no time to do the searching for you this evening.

Thanks, no I haven't been on there but will have a look!

Anything involving sand blasting, sanding etc etc is a no no as we'd lose all of the texture/patina of the beams so it's something we're eager to sort properly but c£4.5k seems dear for five rooms. I'll have a good look on there though.

[Nick_MSM]

kurt535 said:

for future proofing you could...

dig and lay a strip foundation say 600 by 600. block up to just below soil height then use brick to hide it both sides? would probably only lay 450-500mm a day and let it go off

Thanks, we've got a structural engineer coming out next week to look at this and an internal wall. Will hopefully have a better idea of options then.

8-P said:

Great looking place, any more updates?

Thanks - only minor bits at the moment, repairing windows, sheds. The big work won't be starting until we've heard back from planning...

I'll post some new images soon though.