Four months or so on an we’ve done it! The Bungalow Cottage has now been converted to 4 en-suite bedrooms – all ground floor, naturally! The new rooms are: Elva The former kitchen, now a single ensuite with private access to the outside and inside, using the existing fully accessible bathroom as its ensuite. Colour
Alston Hall was, until the beginning of last year, a sister college to Higham based in the Ribble Valley in Lancashire. We shared many tutors and, indeed, students, and strived to be true to the same aims of lifelong learning, at one time both being part of the, now defunct, Adult Residential College’s Association (ARCA).
Well, we have completed the conversion of three of the bedrooms in the Bungalow Cottage to ensuites on time! There’s never an easy way, but we had to do it and the last couple of months have involved countless hours from several people, both paid and voluntary. Special mention must go especially to (Mrs Principal)
More than just a redecoration, this one. Those familiar with the Bungalow will recognise that this 1960s one 3 bedroom, one bathroom house originally built for the Warden when Higham was a girl’s school, was hardly up to scratch for modern needs, although it did boast one advantage – that it offers the only ground
As ever, with an old building – an ours’ is nearly 200 years old – there have been challenges with our redecoration. Because we are stubbornly refusing to compromise and do things by halves, we are facing these challenges head-on. In the long run, it will cost less money, but in the short term, we
Those of you who know Higham may be familiar with the end of the Dining Room where tea and coffee and some food is served. It was blue for a long time, clashing with the rest of the Dining Room. So we decided to bring it into line and match it up. We chose a
The Pictures tell the story really. There is always something else to do, whatever the job here at Higham. People who think it is just a case of a lick of paint are mistaken. Behind the job of redecorating the Study at the top of the main stairs have been two other major jobs: Repairing
One of our largest ensuite bedrooms in the Hall is having some TLC. Room 15 boasts two wonderful gothic arched windows facing the front. Unfortunately, it also has boasted leaks from both the roof through the window surrounds and the ceiling (due to condensation in the attic). These issues having been addressed, our professional decorator
We’ve finally sorted the majority of work on Rooms 4 and 5. If you remember, these both were in need of brightening up and we took on the challenge of improving them acoustically and aesthetically. The result is very pleasing, especially now the headboard and shelving have been fitted for each room which is now
Those students who are familiar with these two bedrooms may identify with the fact that they both suffered from ‘snore-bleed’ through the adjoining wall. This was due to the fact that when the rooms were originally divided many years ago, the wall between them was just a stud partition. Now, however, it has been enhanced
For a long time the wafer-thin wall between 4 & 5 has allowed deep snorers to keep their neighbours awake. Well, we are eliminating this problem, prior to a redecoration, by putting up an acoutsically-dampening wall between these two bedrooms. Room 5 has also over the years suffered from a bit of water ingress –
Finally we have managed to put up new curtains in the redecorated Room 2. The choices of colour and pattern have been very, very deliberate for reasons of both usability and aesthetics. The material chosen reflects the scheme’s queues taken from the framed piece of wallpaper on the feature wall, itself of a colour dictated
We are pleased with what we have managed to do with Bedrooms 1 and 2. We took a 19th Century wallpaper design as a cue and took heritage colours from it. An example of the wallpaper itself has been put in a black metal frame on the wall that has the feature colour. We decided,
It might sound like a small thing, but this banister will make all the difference. This is Bedroom 6, and you will notice that the entrance is up a slight slope – we think the idea was that a slope was better than a step. However, we have added the rail as a hand hold