Autumn Approaches

 

*****Tickets are still available for this weekend’s restoration tour inside Betley Court. Click HERE to get a link to the ticket website. **********

September has brought scorching weather to the gardens at Betley Court. On the paddock, our pippin apple and rowan trees are having a bumper harvest, and it won’t be long until the resident jam makers harvest crab apples for tasty jellies and pickles.

Some of the crab applesin the pippin orchard on the paddock

Over on the formal lawns, Shane has mowed impromptu pathways through the grass, making crop circles around Barron’s magnificent Cedar of Lebanon.

Shane's impromptu crop circles in the formal lawn. Note how mowing has turned the grass brown and stressed looking!

The recent high temperatures are starting to make some plants look a little weary, while others are responding to the heat by switching to seed production mode. It’s changed the hue of the garden dramatically towards the colours of autumn.

Mark, our conservation architect, showing students around, whilst one of MCL's bricklayers makes an excellent job of rebuilding Nash's chimney

Work on the house continues apace. I feel for our wonderful team of builders and craftsmen in this heat. The scaffold wrap that encases the remains of acts as an efficient insulator, trapping the full heat of the day inside the house. Coupled with all the PPE – hard hats, hi-viz, safety clothing and ear defenders that they wear as they graft, they must boil in their skin!

A new floor level goes into what was Caroe Corner

More joists appear every week, and as floorboards cover them, the rooms are becoming recognisable again. In the main part of the house, a new chimney is being built in place of the one that fell during the fire. It is fascinating seeing the builders at work. Even although the chimney will be hidden from view by plaster eventually, every course of bricks is checked with a spirit level.

Rebuilding the chimney above the Nash Room

Without doubt, this chimney will be the best in the house, as the original chimneys have given our structural engineer, Jane, a few worries for their wobbly demeanour. People will often wax lyrical about craftsmanship of old as if it was universally good, but our experience is that if the brickwork was out of sight, then any old brick work would do. The kitchen chimney over what was the main house is a case in point. In places, there were gaps you could see daylight through, and ‘rubbly’ would be the best descriptor of the adjoining wall. Carefully, this was taken back to sound brickwork, and then rebuilt, without any gaps this time!

Nigel (L) being filmed by another Nigel (R). Liz Copper, hiding behind a scaffold pole!

Monday was a strange day, as a film crew from our regional news programme BBC Midlands Today arrived to do a piece for their show, catching up on progress on the rebuild since the fire two years ago. It is quite surreal seeing someone you’ve only ever seen on your TV screen, walking around Betley Court, wearing steel toe-capped shoes and a hard hat. News reporter Liz Copper, and her cameraman, Nigel had a quick reccy around the scaffolding, decided where they wanted to shoot, then Nigel shot some ‘B roll’ pieces of footage of people working, details of the house, and general scenes. Eventually, Nigel and I were interviewed at socially distanced spacing by Liz. The build team, ever the professionals, carried on around us as if it was part of their every day job to have film crews covering their work. Quite right too.

One Tuesday and Wednesday BBC Radio Stoke covered the fire in their feature ‘Two Years On’ as part of Perry Spiller’s ‘Whatever Happened To….?” segment. You can find Perry’s show here for the next 28 days.

The fish pond in the Dingle, looking serene

We do have a few tickets left for our restoration tour this weekend, which includes access to the gardens. Please CLICK HERE for details. We’re looking forward to meeting the brave souls who are happy to walk up to the top levels of the scaffolding, and see how the rebuild is going. It’ll be lovely to share the brilliant workmanship of our build team from MCL with the public, before it disappears under the roofing and plaster.

All best wishes

Ladybird Su