Let the demolition begin!

Finally, after all the weeks of thinking, planning and replanning, costing and re-costing, the demolition began in July 2023.  As previously mentioned, the photos are all watermarked 2024 as I've only just got round to sorting through them!

Shug started stripping out the plasterboard, etc, inside the porch and the water damage to the roof boards was very apparent.

No wonder the roof was so springy!

This shows the smooth-rendered sections of wall that I mentioned previously.  The photo also gives you some idea of the thickness of our stone walls.

The window frames were just falling to pieces,

flaking away around the whole space.

It was amazing that the structure hadn't fallen down with the winter storms we get!

The awful mould was everywhere.

The hole in the floor where the grapevine had been planted.

Once Shug had finished demolishing the top half of the porch, it was easy to see the old raggling.

George then came along to take down the masonry and lift the floorboards.

It was undoubtedly a good sized space but now that we have got to "know" the house a bit more, we could see that it really didn't enhance the visual appeal of St Abbs.

And then we were left with a big, empty slab of concrete!  There had been a step up into the porch from outside, as the floorboards brought the floor level with the front door.  The concrete base itself, therefore, was more or less level with the paths either side.  The base actually turned out to be in pretty good condition, so it didn't have to be taken up.  This meant there was less demolition/concrete laying for George to have to do and enabled a slight tweak to the plans to be made.  A win all round, I'd say 😉

Let the planning begin!

image from Clipart Library

We had a few months of meetings with both Shug and George to discuss the best way forward with the porch.  We initially asked the guys to cost out rebuilding it with the same footprint, but despite their best efforts to keep prices as low as they possibly could, it was simply too much for our budget.  I really feel that I must point out here that they are both great chaps, and are always as accommodating as they possibly can be.  In the end, I think we went through at least three estimates of different dimensions of porch, external finishes, etc, and they didn't bat an eyelid!  I'm sure they must have been sighing inside (I know I would have been!) but they didn't once show any signs of impatience or annoyance.  We have been very lucky to find such great, and to be honest really rather lovely, guys to do work here at St Abbs ~ I'm sure the house appreciates them as much as we do 😊 

Adrian and I went through a period where it seemed all we did was think and talk about the porch 😧  Once we made the decision that our budget just wouldn't stretch to rebuilding the porch with the original dimensions, we then had to decide just what size to make it.  In an ideal world, whilst we would have lost valuable storage space, aesthetically it would have been more pleasing for the porch to have been simply a small vestibule between the outside world and the house.  We had a good look at other houses in our road of a similar style and age to St Abbs to see what design of porches they had, and they were invariably of the vestibule sort.  I do hope that no one saw us peering at the houses, as they may have got the distinct impression that we were would-be burglars 😄

Unfortunately we had a rather big issue to contend with in that when the original porch was constructed, a raggle was made in the stonework of the house to accommodate the lead flashing of the roof.  Obviously this was across the entire width of the porch and whilst it could have been "made good" if we had decided to make the new porch less wide, there were other issues to contend with.  Our house was harled, quite possibly when it was first built, and when the porch was added what then became internal walls either side of the front door were smooth-rendered.  This would have meant that areas either side and above a new, narrower, porch would either have to be left smooth or George would have to harl them.  Either way, it would have been very obvious as it's nigh-on impossible to replicate old harling.  We got so frustrated with trying to decide what to do that at one point we even considered having no porch at all!  Of course that would have left us with larger, and therefore even more obvious, smooth or non-matching harl on the walls 😒

At this point we managed to pull ourselves together and get to grips with the situation.  In the end we decided to have the new porch built at the same width as the old one, but only about half the depth.  This not only took care of the wall issues, but as you will see in a future post, floor and access ones too 😊     

Little words of wisdom

 

The saga continues...

Yesterday I promised you "yuckiness" galore, so if you have a delicate disposition it's probably best not to look through the following photos 😉 Once again, despite the 2024 watermark, these photos were all taken in December 2022.

All the containers and the tarpaulin spread out over the floor was because the roof was leaking in various spots.  Poor Shug did his best to stop the leaks (again, to give us a bit more time) but he was fighting a losing battle.  No sooner had one leak been stopped, than yet another one appeared.

The mould out there was appalling...

...and was on every single surface.

We put down the tarpaulin to stop the floorboards from getting saturated.

When we first bought St Abbs we had thought that we could perhaps rescue the porch...

...but it was too far gone.

This corner is where the infamous grapevine had been planted ~ into the ground!  There was a hole right through the concrete base beneath the floorboards.  After Adrian had removed the vine and the sunken barrel it had been planted into, he filled the hole as best as he could with rubble and put a wooden board over the top.  Of course, this didn't stop the dampness rising up from the ground below.

The window frames and sills were rotting,

a combination of leaking windows...

...and rampant condensation.

The mould covering the plasterboard had penetrated all the way through to the porch walls behind.

This was the no-longer opening side door.  It had rotted along the bottom edge, so Adrian attached a piece of board to it to stop the worst of the weather from getting in.  Mould soon started to appear along the new piece of board.

Naturally, the ceiling was no better than the walls! 

The plasterboard had been papered over at some point, and the mould was both on top of and beneath it.

All in all, the porch was an extremely unpleasant and unhealthy place.  I am extremely glad that it wasn't a "room" that we lived in, simply a passing-through area; let's face it, it would have been impossible to live in there.  Shug, despite his very best efforts, being unable to stem the leaks was the straw that finally broke the camel's back.  We limped through the winter of 2022/23 with the leaks, ever-increasing amounts of mould, and the whole structure getting more rickety, but we knew the time had come for the porch to be replaced.

Naturally, that didn't turn out to be quite as simple or straightforward as we had hoped 😄

A new saga

Despite my lack of posts, there was still plenty going on here at the 'ole homestead!  We were reaching something of a crisis point with the porch, and came to the conclusion that we would have to have something done with the bloody thing before it fell down 😒 By the way, ignore the 2024 watermark on these photos; they were actually taken in December 2022 (!) and have been languishing on my computer since then 😏

It was rotting at an alarming rate and to try to give us a bit more time, Shug fitted some plastic sills to temporarily stem the tide.

The porch entrance was from the side, I expect to shelter the doorway from the weather somewhat.

As you can see, the side windows were simply panes of thin greenhouse-type glass.

At some point in its life, the porch had a second doorway ~ we have no idea when it ceased to be used 😕

 It's a very large "porch" and looked just like what we suspected it actually was: a glorified greenhouse plonked onto the front of the house.  I'm sure that St Abbs was much more attractive before it was added.

Tomorrow I shall treat you to all the photos I took of the inside, so prepare yourselves for even more yuckiness 😉

Peace...

www.allposters.co.uk

Father, Mother, God,

Thank you for your presence during the hard and mean days.

For then we have you to lean upon.

Thank you for your presence during the bright and sunny days.

For then we can share that which we have with those who have less.

And thank you for your presence during the Holy Days.

For then we are able to celebrate you and our families and our friends

For those who have no voice, we ask you to speak.

For those who feel unworthy, we ask you to pour your love out in waterfalls of tenderness.

For those who live in pain, we ask you to bathe them in the river of your healing.

For those who are lonely, we ask you to keep them company.

For those who are depressed, we ask you to shower upon them the light of hope.

Dear Creator, You, the borderless sea of substance, we ask you to give to all the world that which we need most.....PEACE.

Maya Angelou

(4th April 1928 - 28th May 2014)  

Little words of wisdom

 

Peace...

www.allposters.co.uk

Father, Mother, God,

Thank you for your presence during the hard and mean days.

For then we have you to lean upon.

Thank you for your presence during the bright and sunny days.

For then we can share that which we have with those who have less.

And thank you for your presence during the Holy Days.

For then we are able to celebrate you and our families and our friends

For those who have no voice, we ask you to speak.

For those who feel unworthy, we ask you to pour your love out in waterfalls of tenderness.

For those who live in pain, we ask you to bathe them in the river of your healing.

For those who are lonely, we ask you to keep them company.

For those who are depressed, we ask you to shower upon them the light of hope.

Dear Creator, You, the borderless sea of substance, we ask you to give to all the world that which we need most.....PEACE.

Maya Angelou

(4th April 1928 - 28th May 2014)  

Little words of wisdom

Peace...

 

www.allposters.co.uk

Father, Mother, God,

Thank you for your presence during the hard and mean days.

For then we have you to lean upon.

Thank you for your presence during the bright and sunny days.

For then we can share that which we have with those who have less.

And thank you for your presence during the Holy Days.

For then we are able to celebrate you and our families and our friends

For those who have no voice, we ask you to speak.

For those who feel unworthy, we ask you to pour your love out in waterfalls of tenderness.

For those who live in pain, we ask you to bathe them in the river of your healing.

For those who are lonely, we ask you to keep them company.

For those who are depressed, we ask you to shower upon them the light of hope.

Dear Creator, You, the borderless sea of substance, we ask you to give to all the world that which we need most.....PEACE.

Maya Angelou

(4th April 1928 - 28th May 2014) 

Little words of wisdom

 

Peace...

www.allposters.co.uk

Father, Mother, God,

Thank you for your presence during the hard and mean days.

For then we have you to lean upon.

Thank you for your presence during the bright and sunny days.

For then we can share that which we have with those who have less.

And thank you for your presence during the Holy Days.

For then we are able to celebrate you and our families and our friends

For those who have no voice, we ask you to speak.

For those who feel unworthy, we ask you to pour your love out in waterfalls of tenderness.

For those who live in pain, we ask you to bathe them in the river of your healing.

For those who are lonely, we ask you to keep them company.

For those who are depressed, we ask you to shower upon them the light of hope.

Dear Creator, You, the borderless sea of substance, we ask you to give to all the world that which we need most.....PEACE.

Maya Angelou

(4th April 1928 - 28th May 2014)