The chapel
WE BOUGHT the chapel in September 2007 from Alan and Marcia Wilson. They’d already developed the ground floor to make an attractive living area in what was once the school room. They’d also put a double bedroom on the first floor and installed heating and lighting in the chapel but still we were left with a vast space the size of a very large house. The priority, then, when we came to the main chapel refurbishment, was to wind- and weatherproof it, repair the leaking stained glass windows and corroded mullions, and – most important of all – build a model railway room for Ian. That, and quite a bit more besides, is what we have now done.
Askrigg
The work started in April and finished, more or less on time, in August. Managing the project and doing the building work were GE Brown and Son of Low Row in Swaledale. They’re a family firm – father George Edward and son Andrew – with a long-time connection with the United Reformed Church at Low Row where (coincidentally) Ian practises with the Swale Singers every Sunday afternoon. Pictures of all of them and of the work in progress are on various posts. throughout the blog. But below is what it looks like now. Ignore the dates on some of the pictures – my camera settings were wrong.
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- The chapel
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- The new double bedroom
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- Askrigg
The chapel was built by the Methodists in 1878 to what was then a not particularly grand design. It was Askrigg Methodist Church: nobody’s quite sure when it was renamed Bottom Chapel. Apart from the parish church it’s the most prominent building in Askrigg. In fact it looks remarkably like the one I used to attend, very reluctantly, as a child in a Derbyshire village. Even the steps at the front are the same.
There was at some stage a top chapel, too, at the north end of Askrigg but there’s little evidence of that now. We have original deeds dating back to 1807, tracking every change of ownership of land and buildings as the site developed.
There was a caretaker’s cottage in the present garden of the chapel which burnt down about 50 years ago. A friend remembers as a small child watching a film in the Temperance Hall next door, when the place was evacuated as firemen fought the blaze. For us the fire was fortuitous: it’s given us a relatively large (for a chapel) garden which has been cleverly redesigned by the previous owners. A stone-flagged patio, decent-sized fish pond and a lawned area at the bottom which we’re in the process of transforming into a vegetable patch. Well, That’s the plan. Potatoes and onions so far but what does the future hold?
The chapel was de-consecrated and sold for development in 1994. The ground-floor is where we live. It was once the Sunday school and meeting area – older villagers remember having their wedding receptions here after marrying in the chapel upstairs. Being able to live in a part of the building almost totally separate from where the extensive work was going on was a big plus.
It hasn’t been cheap – is anything that’s worth doing? – but it has been a relatively stress- and hassle-free experience. And the result, we think, is stunning: we couldn’t have wished for a better one.
