My Barn Conversion

We had a night away at the lovely, Llys Meddyg in Newport, Pembrokeshire a couple of weeks ago. Fabulous weather in a picturesque place, a great meal and I really liked the use of colour and textures in the hotel. Take this as an example: From Travel Perhaps we should get a bit bolder withContinue reading Use of colour

I need a gate to fit this gap…. (click to enlarge) To build or buy?.. that is the question…

The limewashed gable-end of the barn, done in October 2008 needs a bit of a touch-up so I’ve been looking for a ‘recipe’ for limewash. The builder who originally limewashed it for me used a bagged hydrated lime mixed with water in something like a 3/4:1 (75kg/100kg water:25kg lime) mix. But as I’ve still gotContinue reading Limewash recipe

I seem to have been uploading a lot of before pictures to my Picasa account recently – photographs of piles of soil, holes in the ground, unfinished interiors and unbuilt things. For most of these there’s already an accompanying after, as I’ve at last been making progress and things are getting finished. Well, maybe notContinue reading Lots of befores…

I’ve moved two tonnes of 40mm clean stone over the last couple of days and bloody hard work it’s been. The large 40mm stone has to be the hardest thing to shovel that I’ve ever worked with, small stone is definitely easier. The stone has gone into reestablishing the land drain that runs along theContinue reading Stoned!

Update on building progress during June 2011…

When it comes to the barn, at the moment, the skill about which I know very little, but with which I plan to achieve much is woodworking. I have the following on my to-do list to be built: shelves under the stairs, book cases along the landing, a cabin bed and boxing-in in the secondContinue reading Woodworking Plans

In my ongoing search for garden inspiration, I spotted this wooden bench at the Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust site near Slimbridge, Gloucestershire. I’d previously been rather taken with the cob building at Slimbridge, building my own cob building being one of the key items on my ‘to do when I’ve got the time’ list. FromContinue reading Bench