Sunday 2 March 2014

2014 The Biggest Year of our Lives

The First of March
see's the official start of our 6th Year
at Barrington Court.


As the years have gone by, we have moved
along the building.
This was our first showroom back in 2009
as I look back at this picture
I feel as if we had this pretty much
spot on , I did like it.
But the workshop space was very limited
and the National Trust wanted to create
more workshops in this space below,
further along the building.
This room was a total of 5 bays long
Ideally I would have liked just 3 of
the bays, to double my workshop size
and give me the same size showroom,
But we either had to take it all or none.

So we set about changing this into the new all singing
 all dancing workshop & showroom.
With No Money, it was a big decision.
 But we got stuck in and in the end the showroom
which is in the picture above and below looked
Amazing.
Just what I wanted, the way I wanted it!
Then the NT gained the funding to replace the roof on the barn
at the end of our workshop
and in August 2012 a decision had to be made
Do we take it?
Of course we do!
It would give us the chance to grow,
with a separate school room, more
natural light, and the chance
to be able to fit in a bigger kiln.
There's not much that happens quickly
when your dealing with the NT.
And it was May 2013 before the barn was looking like this.

So we set about putting our stamp on it
We try and keep as much character as possible
in any area we live & work in.
And when a room has no character
we set about creating it
as we had to do in the School room.
Once again with absolutely no budget
to work with.

It works a treat.
And on the outside we have to keep it
as simple as possible.
It's proving to be a great space to work in
the natural light during the day
is just so nice for working in
and in the evenings the sun sets
are just a dream.
So here we are the start of year six
it's often been said that the first five years
of any business are the hardest
and more people go out of business
in the first five years, than at any other time.
But I feel as if I've found my feet
I Have a clear idea of the direction I want to go
and with Marion now on board,
and our wedding in August,
We Both feel that 2014 is going to be
 a good year for us.

3 comments:

Anna M. Branner said...

I agree. Here's to 2014! Cheers!

Dennis Allen said...

Paul, all these spaces look fabulous.One of you has some fine decorating skills.

doug Fitch said...

That's a lovely post :)

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