Conservation Email and Thoughts

Hello.

I forgot to mention in yesterday's post that I had been in touch with conservation to check the works we wanted to do were in line with the listing and whether we needed to apply for formal written consent. Below is the reply...

Dear Ben

I am well thank you, and I am pleased that you now feel ready (after the last episode) to take on further works - very resilient!

Here are the comments in relation to the issues you raise:

1. Floorboards: As the floorboards are modern replacements you will not require listed building consent to paint them, unless it is to a colour that is substantially out of keeping. We can not ask you to replace them with new floorboards.

2. Replacing the gypsum plaster with a lime plaster is an alteration but not one that impacts on the special interest of the building and is, as you know, an enhancement. Thus, no listed building consent would be required and this is fully supported by this team.

3. Secondary glazing would only require listed building consent if it is interfering with any special features, such as original/moulded timber linings. From memory this is not the case at your house, so no listed building consent would be required.

4. Wood Burning Stove - a ridge vent would be acceptable and is much preferred to a standard vent which often sits very proud of the roofscape. You will require listed building consent for this element so we can fully consider the potential impact on the fabric (visual and physical) that feeding and venting the stove would have on the building. It is not too contentious if the vents are inconspicuous and the flue does not protrude through or too close to any significant features.

Kind Regards

So as you can see it's all tickety boo, which is great.

You may have also noticed I enquired about a wood burning stove for the spare room. I think this would be a fantastic feature - but could be tricky and expensive to install, so we'll put it on the back-burner (great pun, i know) for now. We can always do it at a later date if we fancied!

Despite my frustrations at the start of this building project I have to say that the conservation office in Huddersfield are very helpful, quick to reply and actually just want to make sure people look after their old buildings correctly. It doesn't mean I necessarily agree with all their policies, but when i see some of the techniques and materials people use on old buildings it saddens me as it damages the evidence of the history of our country. I'm pleased that our home improvements are not only improving the look of the property, but actually preserving the fabric of the building and allowing it to last a little bit longer!

In other thoughts over the last 24 hours I've been thinking what connectivity we may need in the spare room. I'm planning on running coaxial cable for possible TV installation and network cable for potential media streaming service around the house.

As part of our build project we are sorting our gear out room by room, and we're thinking of backing all CDs and DVDs on to a media server and then installing the ability to stream them around the house to any room over the network. We could then pack CD's/DVDs away rather than having them all out on display taking up precious room. It's a nice idea, i don't know if we'll do it, but it makes sense to put any cables we need in now.

That's all for now, tea break over. Back to work.

Ben.