Bere Regis Restoration project

We were offered this original hut by a Bere Regis, Dorset farmer.  It had been used as the farm workers' lunch hut for many years, and we found a brand of B and a J inside, which we have since discovered stands for Bedford and Jesty, a local watercress grower who also farmed around Bere Regis..  The hut had a strange slope on it, front to back, so we removed the wheels and levelled it up on the chassis. It was stripped right down to the frame, which was patched in with new oak.  The wheels were seized so we put them in a big fire to free them up.  They were then shot blasted and repainted.  The new owner, a farmer from Herefordshire, bought down some old corrugated to reclad the hut with aged galvanised.  We made a new door, fitted a window and matched the interior blue / grey paint.  The hut has now been delivered to the ancient old farm near Hereford.

 

Living van restoration project.

We were asked to collect this interesting living van from a village near Taunton for restoration.   We believe it was originally built as a Devon salmon fishing hut.   It was purchased by the current owners family in the 1950's and used by them as a holiday hut in the Quantock hills.  We've seen a wonderful old photo of the family camping in and around the hut.  It seems to have been built on a gypsy wagon or gun carriage chassis, and was in quite a poor way when we collected it.  Johnno (who became very attached to this project!) spent many hours on the restoration, trying to keep as much of the original as possible whilst giving it the feel of a Plankbridge hut interior.  He added a much better porch area than before.   Now Alice, the next generation of the family to use it, can enjoy the hut just as her family did in the 1950's.

Coombe Bissett hut

We have completed the restoration / preservation of this Farris hut for a customer who lives near Coombe Bissett, Salisbury where it was made.  It has a simple bed built in, a small dresser and a woodburner.  It has now been delivered to their family farm in Devon.

Reeves of Bratton restoration -  a hut heading for home

We have restored a very fine original Reeves hut for a customer who lives near the original ironworks at Bratton, Wiltshire.  He lives in a nearby village, and discovered the hut grown into a hedge on a local farm.  When we collected it we parked in the village by the 'memorial' to Reeves of Bratton (a casting of an elevator cog mounted on a plinth which is all that seems to remain of the works) and took photos of the hut.  Our brief on this one was to restore the hut, and then add windows and internal features along the lines of a new build Plankbridge hut.  Johno, our resident restorer, did a fine job and our customer is really happy.  The windows (hand made by local maker David Higgs of Newton joinery) are from Herefordshire oak.  We fitted our framed, ledge and brace door with mortice lock, insulated the hut with airtec aluminium foil and added a small Windysmithy woodburner.  The original Reeves chassis can clearly be seen in the photo below, and our all metal Plankbridge chassis is based on this design.

When we removed the internal hardboard cladding the original tongue and groove boarding was revealed.  Lots of newspaper had been folded and stuffed into the gaps in the boards.  We carefully unfolded it and it was dated around 1917.  Someone, probably a shepherd, was gapping up the boards during the first world war, so it is safe to assume the hut pre-dates that.  We like to think we have given the hut another 100 years.

Chawton House restoration, Alton, Hampshire

We were very pleased to be asked to rebuild a characterful shepherd's hut belonging to the Chawton House Library estate, near Alton in Hampshire, formerly the home of Jane Austen and her family and now a library of womens' literature.  The hut had become very derelict in one of the woods, and they were keen for it to be on display again.  We rebuilt it using as much of the original as we could.  It had previously been some kind of agricultural wagon, very heavily built with an oak frame and stout ironwork.  At some point it had been converted to a shepherds hut, hence the unusual proportions.

We had to restrain ourselves from doing too much obvious restoration, as it needed to look in keeping with the surroundings, and not in any way like a new build.  The original pitch pine door and some of the cladding remains sound, but there were still many, many  hours put into this project.  The hut can now gently mellow down as the new oak weathers, and hopfully William Parsons, the old shepherd whose name is carved inside the door, would be proud to see his hut back home again.

Reeves Renovation - South Dorset

'Just a note to say how delighted I am with our renovated shepherd's hut, it looks lovely and has quite exceeded my expectations!  ... it looks so fresh and well kept up and yet you have managed to keep all the original features and finishes which is just what I wanted....I can see it from my office window and it looks so charming under the trees...I can't wait to light the woodburner and have a cup of tea in there!'

A local estate asked us to renovate their shepherd's hut, which probably had been on the farm since new.  Used as a Gamekeepers hut, the retired keeper, who lives nearby, told us many stories about it.  A vintage car stood in the wood next to the hut for many years, and someone had drawn a fine pencil sketch of the car on the wall inside.  We also found notes, dated 1945, of which fields had been sown at certain dates; again written in pencil on the
walls.

A farm worker had painted the corrugated cladding in electric blue hammerite, so we stripped that back, red oxided the tin and repainted in mid Brunswick green.  This is a particularly good, original hut made by R & J Reeves and Son, Bratton Ironworks, Westbury, Wilts.  The original bed, table and seat are still in place, and we patched in rat holes and floor boards
where needed.  We fitted a Windysmithy wood burner, put new glass in the door and repaired or replaced the forged metal work as required.

Many of the details of a Reeves hut chassis can be seen in our Plankbridge chassis design.

 

Baker & Sons Renovation - Cotswolds

Plankbridge was commissioned to restore an original Baker and Sons, Berkshire shepherd's hut for a customer in the Cotswolds. The brief was to retain it's 'faded glory', add two new windows and remake the original window. We also repaired and installed the antique woodburner. New roof sheets were added, over a new curved timber roof lining, with insulation placed in the roof cavity.

Once the mountain of cattle cake and rat remains had been removed work could begin. It is a fine hut, built in 1895 using oak, elm, pitch pine and some particularly interesting castings and ironwork. It illustrates how highly regarded and significant shepherds' huts were in the rural community.