Introduction

I think it was a house called Revesby Abbey, a magnificent Victorian pile built in 1845 that inspired our own absurd romantic quest to own a stately home. At the time we were in our two bedroom Victorian Terrace in the south of London and a property auction catalogue dropped through the letterbox, in it was this crumbling gothic mansion with a guide price of £55,000 yep I say again £55k. So off we rushed to deepest Lincolnshire to have a look, through the nettles we battled to get to the front door and then into an enormous near derelict entrance hall. It was here that the scales fell away from our eyes, now, we were used to dealing with un modernised flats, shops and houses but in this one room we saw that a lifetime's work and perhaps more importantly, a lifetime's income would be needed. Worse was to come as we saw rooms with no floors where they had rotted away and then rooms with no roof where the lead had been nicked, in short we could see no way we would be able to afford even the basic restoration of this project.

We began to realise why it was that houses such as these have been known to exchange hands for as little as £1, there was simply no way that the house would ever be worth as much as the renovation costs even as a finished building. So with a heavy heart we walked away faintly hoping that they would not find a buyer brave (or more likely stupid) enough to buy it. In the end it did sell and then it changed hands time and time again, and now I think it is still pretty much in the same state as we saw it all those years ago. We had walked away and it was the sensible thing to do but it had ignited a flame that would not be extinguished.

Ten years later and several trips to see rambling dilapidated mansions around the country, we came across Rise Hall. It was big, it was grand but if we are really honest it was not particularly beautiful and in a really appalling state of repair, but although it was miles from where we had our house in London it didn't have the problems that so many other houses we looked at did, not problems like a leaking roof, every rot imaginable, Damp and Rodent infestations, I mean things that could never be changed, like a motorway on your doorstep, open cast mining up to the foundations or being at the end of a major airport runway.

Rise Hall has been our family home for over 10 years, and hopefully with the help of money coming in from wedding ceremonies it can still be a family home and we can also continue the restoration.

TV SHOW

Beeny's Restoration Nightmare is a documentary we filmed over the major phase of work that was done to get Rise Hall ready for events to be held. We felt it was a great opportunity to try and explain the struggle that houses such as these have to survive and along the way were also able to talk about various building issues that are relevant for any home however big or small. We hope you enjoy the show!

» See the renovation