Alderney

The Refurbishment

The Basement

This part of the house was totally derelict consisting of two flooded basement rooms separated by a corridor leading to the back door under the extension. Allegedly it had been home to the previous owner's forty chickens and with no waterproof flooring, heating, services and insufficient light or ventilation it was certainly unfit for human habitation.

The plan was to convert the area into the kitchen/breakfast room, utility room and snug that exists today. However to achieve this the floor area needed to be lowered by 300mm. As expected, early exploratory diggings revealed that the house had no foundations at all and merely rested on large lumps of granite.

In order to lower the basement level whilst maintaining, and indeed improving, the structural integrity of the building underpinning was essential. A series of alternate pits were dug under the house to a depth of about 1.6 metres and filled with concrete. Fifty-two pits were dug entailing the removal of 120 tonnes of earth/spoil and the insertion of 90 tonnes of concrete, an operation entirely carried out by hand owing to the area being inaccessible to suitable machinery. This took eight of us just eleven days to complete but, then again, Alderney Week approached and we all needed a drink!

Once cast and dry-packed, the basement walls were cleaned and tanked with several coats of waterproof slurry and two steel beams were placed between the rooms to enable the whole area to be opened up. Concrete slab was poured, insulation and underfloor heating installed, before the final screeding and tiling. In the centre of the snug a cannonball, believed to be early 19th century, is set in the floor in the location it was unearthed during excavations.

Demolition

The overall aim of the refurbishment of Newford House was to return it as much as possible to its late Georgian splendour whilst taking advantage of present-day engineering to enjoy it in a 21st century way. As such, the first casualty had to be a two-storey extension of quite breathtaking ugliness, supported by rusting stilts at the back of the house which had incorporated the kitchen and one of the bathrooms. 10 days of constant jack-hammering finally achieved this - German concrete must rival diamond as the world's hardest element.

All other non-original parts were similarly removed and both exterior and interior were totally stripped out. This gave us the opportunity to assess the extent of the decay below. Whilst this turned out to be not as comprehensive as we had thought there was still plenty of it.

The Roof

The ceiling level needed to be raised considerably on the upper floor to allow for the planned two bedrooms and bathroom which necessitated modifying the roof structure.

The original, badly-decayed slates were removed and the timber structure beneath inspected. This was generally in good order with the main structure intact needing the replacement of a few timbers and treating of the whole with suitable rot-proofing.

Five small dormers and one large one were built and the whole roof was re-felted, battened and newly slated. Particular detail was put into the dormer cheeks (clad in beaver tail slates), the apexes and the rafter feet to set the roof apart in this important heritage area of the town.

Glazing

It was originally intended to refurbish some of the windows and replace others but further inspection revealed that none were suitable for retention. With the aid of a Trust grant new wooden windows were fitted throughout the house replicated from existing sashes.

The Living Areas

The first floor was divided up to maintain the large, landing stairwell typical of houses of that age but to include three bedrooms and two bedrooms. The limitations that governed the layout were the house's choice not ours - soil pipes for bathrooms had to follow the fall of the floors which also happened to be closest to the main drain. As many of the original floorboards as possible were saved - over 1 ¼ inches thick, they will outlast many other things.

The ground floor was essentially maintained in its original layout with a sitting room the length of the house, a sizeable study and cloakroom. An airing cupboard was built adjacent to the latter.