Before and now, 10 years later!

[DJH]

Thank you for the compliment Joce. A house like this, an old farmhouse at the end of a lane, has always been Mrs DJH's dream and the fact that it's in Ireland doesn't matter a jot. None of the work we've done here has been a chore and we've loved seeing the house come back to life. Like everyone on here It's been a labour of love.There are neighbours and friends here who new the family that was in the house before we bought it and they are all delighted but slightly puzzled as to why we haven't modernised it. Looking at the pictures we've taken of work we did every time we came over it shows we made 48 trips on the ferry and twice when we flew over.

Not too sure when the T&G paneling went in. We think the house was 'modernised' before 1895 which was the date of a penny coin we found in the top of the wall which couldn't have been put there later because of it's location in some mortar. The nails I took out I would have been much later than this date and I would hazard a guess that it was about the middle of last century . The curtained wardrobe in the fourth picture was built in situ in the bedroom and had some newspaper dated 1910 which had been stuffed in a gap.

Most of this work had been done to a high standard and must have been one of the few two storey farmhouses in the area. The earliest records from the circa 1840 census (the lads blew up all the early records which were held in the Customs House! ) rate the house as a Class 2 dwelling which it gained through having two bedrooms I believe. The house and all it's buildings are noted as being thatched which would be common at the time. This information comes from the notebooks that the surveyors took at the time the census took place.

Tomorrow we start on the second bedroom to finish the things we left undone...

We took eight trailer loads from the house and outbuildings and it hadn't been lived in for over forty years. :roll:

 

[worms]

Have you still got the trusty Ford 4610?

 

[DJH]

It belongs to my neighbour and he's just had it completely restored. He bought it second hand back in about 1972, in fact he bought two and his brother had the other one because it was more expensive. It's true what they saw about men from West Cork.

Doug

PS He's 86 years young and comes on the vintage runs on it with me on my 1948 Ferguson when he's not off travelling somewhere!

 

[DJH]

The second and last bedroom finished yippee..............







Now for the landing and stairs.........

Doug

 

[DJH]

After we bought the house we cleaned it out and Mrs DJH stepped on this bit of floor and went straight through........





Luckily there were no nails or anything else sharp on the joists as she went through them. I think she was more annoyed that she'd made a mess on the floor below after she had just swept it up than she was about falling ....... :lol:

 

[agbagb]

Agb's Missus

Congratulations Doug, that looks wonderful. Just hope ours doesn't take quite so long. There should be half a roof on ours by now. The pictures of the floor Mrs. DJH went through caused a wry smile. When we took up the carpet in our bathroom the floor was exactly the same as that but it had been supporting a cast iron bath, which I had used :shock: , good job there was hardly any hot water at the time :lol:

 

[DJH]

Here's the hole she made on her way down........ she wasn't in a bath but she had a bucket with water in it at the time........... :lol:



as it is now..



Doug

PS Did you get my PM Agb's missus?

 

[agbagb]

Agb's Missus

Crikey, the more I look at those photos , the more I realise how lucky I am. There is no interior room under the bath, just a jennel, open to view from a busy street . Yes thank you got the PM but we're still undecided. Will PM you and you can have the casting vote :lol:

 

[LadyArowana]

That bedroom is looking beautiful now, the only improvement I could suggest would be a lovely flwuffy puddy tat on the bed.

 

[DJH]

Your wish is my command your Ladyship.........

Here's Topsy wopsy soundly sleepy weeping on the beddy weddy.............. apologies to Penners et al. :lol:



Doug

 

[LadyArowana]

Thank you, isn't the new protocol that we have to say "Topsy wopsy ( a cat )" ? :lol:

 

[DJH]

Ooops! I'm not sure where we stand on that now. I think all has calmed down now or has it......... :wink: Does the protocol cover inanimate objects I wonder :?:

 

[victorianjob]

Really great to see the after photos. I love the windows!

 

[DJH]

The landing is finished... whoopee! Now for the stairwell and kitchen.





and then the living room, lobby, bathroom and the outside...

Doug

 

[JoceAndChris]

Well done Doug! That's looking very smart indeed - I expect your wife is very pleased! (except for all the bits you haven't yet done :wink: )

 

[Nigel Watts]

I think I prefer the wonky old plaster and low T&G ceiling, but it sounds like you needed to remove both given the state it was in.

 

[LadyArowana]

Looking good! I particularly like where the horse has been stabled. Is he one of your pieces?

 

[DJH]

Well, in a way he is your ladyship, but I never cast from it any copies. I was very fortunate to live near a family of world class sculptors, carvers and modelers in fact, at my recommendation they moved into a unit next door to me and had it as their casting shop. Whilst I was visiting their old workshop to collect a commission from them I noticed that they had modeled this horse in clay for an Arab client who was to have it cast in silver ( it's and Arabian stallion) and I admired it so much I asked them to cast it in bronze resin for me and there it now lives.

I shan't copy it as I have the only other one that isn't in silver!!

I think I prefer the wonky old plaster and low T&G ceiling, but it sounds like you needed to remove both given the state it was in.

Yes, I did have to remove all the T&G paneling Nigel and I then had the dilemma which we all face, of how up to date we should restore our properties. The paneling was, of course, a form of improvement to the house about 80 years ago but the underside of the roof would have originally been seen with the underside of the slates rendered in mortar between the rafters and then whitewashed. We opted for a false version of the later using white boarding to simulate the mortar and a ventilated warm roof above.

Most of the walls in the house had wall coverings either polystyrene sheets with wall paper or just wall paper which we didn't want to replace. My excuse for the landing is that very little wall is exposed between the windows and, with the curtains outside the window reveals along with the risk of brushing against the old plaster, we plasterboarded it over and used a wall paper that imitates rough troweled mortar.

Doug

 

[MissSteel]

Hi DJH,
I am new here so totally unfamiliar with your restoration project. Its looks fab from the photo's! Can i ask did you have to replace the entire roof when you started the project? It looks in a similiar condition as the roof on the house that I am starting on now, unfortunatly our roof is unsavable and needs to be fully replaced. We can save two purlins from the roof but that is about it, and reuse as many slates as possible. Also i was wondering did you have to replace all the joists in those rooms you renovated, or just a few? how did you treat the joists (for woodworm) that you were able to save?
Sorry for all the questions! I'm a newbie to all of this!!

 

[stuwlam]

Hmmmm... the way you've removed the false ceiuling to reveal the vaulted roof in your first bedroom has got me thinking! We think our kitchen and our bedroom above it were originally a barn stuck onto the side of the house. The bedroom has a horrible artexed false ceiling part way up the roofslope like yours, but in the loft above it there are huge oak purlins and both the purlins and the rafters resting on them are limewashed, which I'm told would have been typical of a barn. I'm thinking that ripping down the ceiling and revealing all that wood would make our bedroom rather spectacular.

Anyway, better take care of the outside work first - another year, another project!!