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00:03 Brockfield Hall was built in 1804
00:17 by a York man called Mr. Agar.
00:20 The house was there for his small family, great family
00:24 home, and a place that he could entertain.
00:26 And we started in 2021 and finished a year later, July
00:32 2022.
00:34 So we've been here now a year.
00:36 So I think what we have done in kind of restoring the house
00:40 is to very much restore it back to being a family home.
00:43 We've got three children.
00:44 And take it back to Agar's original design
00:49 to improve the flow of the house.
00:51 The Victorians and the Edwardians
00:53 had created some new walls and some new doors
00:55 and kind of blocked things up.
00:57 So between what we now call our drawing room, and the pram
01:00 room, and the library, and our sitting room,
01:03 all four of those doors were all blocked up.
01:05 So we've now opened those up, creating that kind of enfilade
01:08 that I think is what Agar planned.
01:11 And in restoring Brockfield, both Hatter and I very much
01:15 wanted to bring back that sense of a free-flowing, happy family
01:20 house.
01:21 And then at the back of the house,
01:23 we wanted that to be our entrance in,
01:26 great for the children running in.
01:28 And working with Ben Pentreath and Rupert Cunningham,
01:31 they immediately said, this is what we've got to do.
01:33 We've got to move a wall so that you get the line of sight
01:37 through the spine of the house, which really has transformed
01:40 the whole back of house and then leading
01:42 into this rather wonderful boot room that we've created.
01:47 Underneath the floor of the boot room, and actually
01:49 of the loo, and of the playroom, was this old Yorkstones.
01:53 Underneath sort of concrete screed,
01:54 and we lifted them all up.
01:56 And we've managed to relay them so
01:57 that it runs seamlessly from the ground hall
02:00 all the way back through the house.
02:02 Now you have this wonderful, beautiful, old, but smooth
02:06 Yorkstone floor that goes all the way through the house.
02:09 All over the place, we've managed to reuse, repurpose,
02:11 which has been extremely satisfying,
02:13 and then keeps this sense of age, I suppose.
02:17 It was quite a cold, drafty house,
02:19 so we've installed a new heating system.
02:21 We've replaced every wire.
02:24 So now it feels so much warmer house.
02:29 And then another thing that I think was important to us
02:33 was in our dining room.
02:34 Clever thing that Charlie's grandfather
02:36 did trying to put a bathroom in for a spare bedroom.
02:39 He took a chunk out of the dining room ceiling.
02:41 We took out that bathroom and therefore
02:43 took the ceiling back.
02:44 So you'd never know that it was there.
02:46 And we've actually put a bath, and then a loo,
02:48 and a basin, and a cupboard.
02:50 It's quite fun, and it looks smart,
02:52 and we don't have a chunk out of our ceilings.
02:55 I get a huge satisfaction from our kitchen,
02:57 which feels like a modern kitchen in a way, in its spirit.
03:01 It's just a very lovely, kind of interesting place to be,
03:04 I think.
03:05 And then upstairs, we've actually
03:07 worked with Degorne to create a Chinese wallpaper for the room.
03:12 So it's kind of really designed for the room.
03:15 It almost feels as though it's always been there.
03:18 Charles Hest does brilliant restoration
03:22 of historic houses.
03:23 So that was really lucky, because he
03:24 lives just outside York.
03:26 And he came, and we immediately realized
03:28 he was the sort of person to work with.
03:31 The sort of key bit he did was to all the cornicing.
03:34 He cleaned it out and took off all the layers of paint.
03:37 And then finally, the goal was to be
03:43 able to have a house that kind of shows things well.
03:46 My father collects a group of Yorkshire artists
03:49 called the Stage Group.
03:50 We've created just a great backdrop for some of his art.
03:56 The thing that people always say when they walk around this
03:59 house is, wow, it's always been here,
04:02 after we've restored it, which is great.
04:04 I think we totally occupy the house.
04:06 I think people come in here, and they're amazed we've only
04:08 lived here a year, and that we redecorated the whole thing.
04:11 Every room was touched.
04:12 We have been through the whole house.
04:14 It has come together already to feel like a lovely home.
04:19 We're really honored to have won the Historic Houses
04:22 Restoration Year Award, sponsored by Sotheby's.
04:25 And we couldn't have enjoyed it more, I don't think.
04:27 It's been a challenge, but also a great opportunity.
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