Back in October 2021, our team travelled up to North Yorkshire to meet with clients Alex & Lucy, who got in touch with us about an exciting period property renovation. They called the project ‘All Hands on Wreck’ after stumbling upon a picture of the property in the Sunday Times (more on this later). The property was a tired, but architecturally stunning, Georgian property that hadn’t been lived in for 10 years.
Naturally, we were extremely excited about the prospect of designing it, due to its incredible bones , and we thoroughly enjoyed working with the couple over a series of months from the sidelines through our e-design service . Fast forward a few years on and we are so pleased to be now sharing the results with you. Alex & Lucy have done an incredible job managing the renovation and we’re thrilled to be chatting with them about their renovation experience – good and bad! So how did they do it and was it worth it?! Well, we’ve caught up with them to find out all about it…
Can you tell us how you stumbled across the ‘all hands on wreck article’ & did you happen to be looking for a big project like this, or was it a happy coincidence?
In 2021 we were happily living in a Victorian terrace in Headingley, Leeds, that we had renovated when first purchased. We loved the house, the area and our neighbours, but with our first baby on the way, we knew we wanted a bit more space. We weren’t actively on the lookout, but some friends sent us a Rightmove link to a property in the area of a beautiful Georgian home. Whilst we ended up making an offer, we were informed it had in fact been sold. And that was the end of our short house hunting journey… or so we thought.
3 weeks later, we bought a copy of the Sunday Times.. On opening the Home supplement, we were greeted by a double page spread with the title ‘All hands on wreck’ (we still have the paper) which set the scene with the line ‘Why more house hunters want a ruin as a lockdown project’. The featured property in the article was none other than the house that we’d been told had sold just a few weeks earlier.
Luckily for us, the sale had fallen through and it was now back on the market. We can still remember our first viewing. Driving up the potholed drive to finally be greeted by a majestic, but dilapidated beauty of a building. The windows were all rotten, the roof had holes in and the house was covered in vegetation. But from that first moment, we both fell in love with the property and knew we had to buy it.
Having not been lived in for over 10 years, the fact it was Grade 2 listed, and the scale of the work required put off the majority of potential buyers the Times article acquired. But naively unperturbed, we ended up having an offer accepted at just a shade under the asking price, making it without doubt the most expensive newspaper we’ve ever bought!
What drew you to the property?
We knew we were biting off a big project and looking back probably far more than we could chew, but it really did tick every box. It was steeped in history, had bags of character, generously proportioned with 3.5m+ high ceilings, a great location, near to a station & importantly the perfect size for a growing family. The icing on the cake was that it even came with a 1700 sq ft outbuilding, which presents a future development opportunity should we wish..!
What was the most challenging aspect of the renovation and why?
Cost control is always a challenge, but I’d say the project management and timelines caused us the biggest headaches. Despite our due diligence before appointing, the builder we chose certainly bit off more than he could chew – a fact that became increasingly evident as we progressed through the project. As a result we had to take on a huge amount of the day-to-day running, which alongside both running our own businesses and with a 6 months old in tow was very tough! Needless to say it was the cause of many sleepless nights.
What should have been a 9 month project turned into 17 months of renovations. Sometimes weeks would go by with little progress being made due to lack of manpower and any real plan. Turning up to a building site expecting to see a week of progress, only to find out hardly anything had moved on was hugely demoralising. We ultimately parted ways with the builder near the end of the project and brought a new contractor in, which pushed up already inflated costs, but was our only route out of the situation at the time.
Did you ever have any moments of doubt about tackling something this size, or could you always see the bigger picture?
By this point you won’t be surprised to hear that we certainly had a few ‘What have we done?!’ moments. We’d left a house which, whilst a bit small, we loved. We’d lumped a huge amount of stress and debt on top of already stressful lives, and at some points the light at the end of the tunnel was barely visible. But there was no going back, we’d committed and we simply had to see it through. The only thing that kept us going in the darkest of days was knowing that this was the forever home and we’d never had to go through it ever again. Also, I’m a strong believer that nothing worthwhile is ever particularly easy, and to get our dream home we’d have to endure some pain along the way.
What was your favourite part of using Topology and the e-design service? What did you find the most beneficial aspect?
I think the simple fact that they ‘got’ the style we wanted from the off. From that point onwards it made the process so much easier as we found ourselves signing off the majority of room designs first-time. Topology provided a room-by-room shopping list with multiple options for each item, from beds and wardrobes, down to the small finishing touches like vases and flowers. The options also spanned a range of prices, from premium brands like Soho Home through to Dunelm, which we actually became stalwart fans of through the process. This gave us much more control over the budget as we could save in one area to spend in another. They provided full visuals of each room so we could see everything in situ and were happy to tweak and take on feedback throughout the process. Despite their involvement in the project being close to 2 years end to end, they remained in touch and interested throughout and nothing was ever too much trouble.
What would be your advice to anyone else debating over whether to tackle a renovation of this scale?
Employ a contractor with a brand and reputation to protect. They’ll hopefully be much more invested in making sure things go to plan so you’ll leave them a glowing review. Get extremely clear on what project management will look like, who’s running the site and how often you’ll be expecting updates and in what format. Triple your contingency budget and stress test the whole financial plan. What if it cost twice as much and took twice as long. What would you do and could you survive? And of course, use the Topology team to help with all your interior design needs!
Have a period property renovation of your own to tackle? Get in touch via hello@topologyinteriors.com to enquire about our e-design and on-site services.
