Henry, who produced the structural design brief and plans for our kitchen extension came round on Wednesday to take photos of the finished ‘product’. This reminded me that I had not posted any photos so far, mainly because there are a few bits and pieces to finish off. But then this week we’ve had some glorious light through our roof lantern and this morning it spurred me into action.

But first, this is how it was just after we moved in:

The sitting room then had a galley kitchen (around the right hand corner) and the back door opened onto an oldish, large uPVC conservatory. The conservatory was pleasant enough in summer being shaded by the house and the hedge on the south-west, but its doors also faced north so it was pretty chilly in the winter.

Our plans for replacing it with a properly insulated room were constrained by the hedge and the position of the upstairs windows. We are also in the town’s Conservation Area. We thus had to stick to the original footprint although we could add a metre or so along the rear wall, taking in the exterior downstairs former kitchen window. When it came to the roof, we could have had a shallow lean-to option with roof lights, but decided the parapeted flat roof with lantern would give us the best light.

So: there were all sorts of compromises, including cost, and constraints over access at the rear of the house and to the front of the house for debris removal and deliveries. We also didn’t want to do anything that would be at total odds with this modest little 1920s town house.

It finally came to fruition thanks to weeks of conscientious in-put from builder-hero, Alan Morris, who project managed the whole thing. He was also responsible for some nifty brickwork, as well as taking pains to match, as far as was possible, the original brickwork.

Alan Morris conducting a spot of problem solving  with Graham.

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And the final result suits us very well.

Here are some reminders of what happened in between, starting with the conservatory as moving-in dumping ground:

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And inside, it all went on around us:

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The old kitchen:

Range cooker gone and original access to cloakroom restored. This is now the utility room,  stud-walled and doored. The downstairs loo has been much smartened up and its parma violet and bottle green walls banished. Also discovered but covered up again was an old flue that probably served a laundry copper. Still some finishing off to do in this quarter.

New wall and door to the utility room on the right.

And the new kitchen – yes, I know, It is more than a touch quirky. For one thing, we didn’t domesticate the original outside wall, just washed the spiders off, and kept the window spaces too. Anyone who moves in after us can plaster board over them if they want to.

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We left the window space by the back door open. A kitchen ‘hatch’ no less. It gives us instant access to the utility room sink. Ideal for chucking freshly dug spuds into it:

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And of course there’s the aardvark:

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Handmade units made by Shepherd Hills cabinet makers. The angles either side the cooker were tricky to deal with:

The ‘horrid hedge’, which I’m still tackling, has turned out to be just the place to hang some bird feeders. The sparrows and robin have found them, but the jackdaws haven’t (not yet anyway), and we have good mealtime views of passing birds.

And now, after all that, a good sit down beside the wood burner is called for:

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There’s still a lot to do. Top of my list is that Graham needs to get rid of all his trailing cables. We don’t have TV but stream and screen things we want to watch via a laptop and projector. At present the system is mobile and makeshift, waiting for the moment when all the wiring will be hidden under the bedroom floor. There are signs that this might happen soon. Apart from this, much decorating is still required, and we still haven’t quite moved in. One day…

In the meantime, the Castle is a good place to be.