Welsh Justice
Copyright (c) Richard J Price March 2005
All Rights Reserved
I knew I had inherited a small patch of land in North Wales, near a small market town called Mold but it wasn't until I went to look at it that I realised that I had inherited a building of sorts too.
It was a long, sandstone cowshed, measuring some 30 yards long and 10 yards wide. The slate roof had at some time been replaced with asbestos, which in turn had been removed, and replaced in parts with corrugated steel, though I did see a large pile of slates stacked outside the building at one end, almost entirely concealed by nettles and blackberry brambles, there was no way of knowing if they were useable.
The floor had been part concreted, and was part original flagstones, and sloped downwards from either side towards a leaf-filled drainage channel running right down the middle.
Large patches of grey sky were visible through the roof where panels were missing altogether, and smaller patches through where the steel had corroded. If there hadn't been then the place would have been in darkness because there were no windows, not that there were any long forgotten treasures to be found in there, just rubble, leaves, water and ancient rotting straw.
To actually do anything with the building was a formidable task. There was no way I could get planning permission to make it residential so there was little point in throwing stupid amounts of money at it, yet it had a charm and tranquility there and it would have been criminal to just walk away and not do anything with it.
Over the coming weeks I drew up plans and visited several more times, taking notes and measurements.
By late May I was ready to begin work.
I had a skip delivered along with tools, scaffolding a generator and various building materials and set to the task. It took an entire weekend to unblock the drainage channel, remove all the rubble, sweep the walls and floors, scrub the walls and floors with bleach and cover the roof with transparent blue polythene sheeting.
The roofing beams were old but sound and I spent another week removing the old steel panels and gradually replacing them with a mixture of aluminium and transparent PVC panels.
By the time I had completed that task the place was already looking better, and I had started sleeping there at night, my bed consisting of two scaffolding planks and a sleeping bag.
It rained heavily on a couple of days and I was glad to find that my roof was watertight, though I did have to realign some of the exterior guttering.
I built a chimney breast at the flagstoned end of the building and installed a wood burning stove. I purchased an old ceramic sink and installed that, the waste outlet being connected to the centre drainage channel (which I covered with pieces of flag stone I had cut to perfect size with a stihl saw) and was fed by a single cold water tap, it being a relatively simple matter to extend pipework that fed a neighbouring farmers water trough. (Oops, I never asked first).
I replaced the heavy wooden doors with new ones that I constructed myself, and though I built a small shed to house the generator outside the building and wired up two lights and a double socket point I also installed hooks and purchased half a dozen hurricane lamps.
Furniture I made from scaffolding planks and rough timber - a hard settee and chair, a coffee table, a dining table, two benches, a 'kitchen cabinet' and two cots, one double and one single. Upholstery seemed pretty pointless so I made large cushions, tailored to exact sizes needed, including large futon style cushions for the settee, and to use as mattresses on the cots.
A couple of brightly coloured and cheap rag rugs and cheaply bought second hand furniture (including a rocking chair and a couple of bookcases) and some houseplants, and I had an excellent and sizeable 'holiday home'. It had cost me less than £3,000 and had kept me occupied for two months.
I now began to work on the outside, relaying paths, scything back brambles and constructing a rough latrine shed, remembering my military engineering training. I finally liberated the slates, which it transpired were too damp and crumbly to have been used for roofing, though broken into fine chippings made a good ground cover for the beds where I introduced forsythia and buddleia, and those that were solid enough not to break I painted on in acrylics and hung on the walls inside my 'home from home'.
I found a rusty archaic looking plough in the brambles at the back of the building, and cleaned it up with a wire brush before dragging it to the front, where it lent an air of rustic charm and 'days gone by' to the whole picture, which was finally completed when I purchased a couple of ancient hay baskets and fastening them to the outside wall either side of the doors, filled them with moss, lobelia, nasturtiums and pansies.
It had been hard work and I had lost nearly 30 lbs in weight during the renovation, now was the time to relax, put my feet up, invite some friends and put some of that weight back on.
That first weekend I invited my sister, her husband and her kids (who camped out in the adjoining field which I owned). We had a great time sitting smoking marijuana and drinking wine in the late summer sun, sat up late playing chess and talking shit.
It was my own place, it was peaceful, it was idyllic. Nothing could take that away from me.
I entertained friends and family there until mid october when the nights got too cold for anyone to realistically enjoy camping outside. I checked on the place regularly throughout the winter except when the snow made it completely inaccessible, kept the generator running for half an hour on each visit and lit the wood stove, and the following year, in summer, many happy hours were spent there by many people.
The bombshell came just before Christmas. A letter from the highways department saying that they were building a road right through my land and were invoking a 'compulsory purchase order'.
The amount they gave me was pitifully small and I never saw a penny of it because it was all used up with hiring solicitors to fight the order.
And to add insult to injury, they changed their mind about the road and instead sold my land, and all the adjoining land, with planning permission for 200 homes to a private developer.
More writing and artwork at: rjpriceart.tribe.net/
"I am not mad"
Copyright (c) Richard J Price March 2005
All Rights Reserved
I knew I had inherited a small patch of land in North Wales, near a small market town called Mold but it wasn't until I went to look at it that I realised that I had inherited a building of sorts too.
It was a long, sandstone cowshed, measuring some 30 yards long and 10 yards wide. The slate roof had at some time been replaced with asbestos, which in turn had been removed, and replaced in parts with corrugated steel, though I did see a large pile of slates stacked outside the building at one end, almost entirely concealed by nettles and blackberry brambles, there was no way of knowing if they were useable.
The floor had been part concreted, and was part original flagstones, and sloped downwards from either side towards a leaf-filled drainage channel running right down the middle.
Large patches of grey sky were visible through the roof where panels were missing altogether, and smaller patches through where the steel had corroded. If there hadn't been then the place would have been in darkness because there were no windows, not that there were any long forgotten treasures to be found in there, just rubble, leaves, water and ancient rotting straw.
To actually do anything with the building was a formidable task. There was no way I could get planning permission to make it residential so there was little point in throwing stupid amounts of money at it, yet it had a charm and tranquility there and it would have been criminal to just walk away and not do anything with it.
Over the coming weeks I drew up plans and visited several more times, taking notes and measurements.
By late May I was ready to begin work.
I had a skip delivered along with tools, scaffolding a generator and various building materials and set to the task. It took an entire weekend to unblock the drainage channel, remove all the rubble, sweep the walls and floors, scrub the walls and floors with bleach and cover the roof with transparent blue polythene sheeting.
The roofing beams were old but sound and I spent another week removing the old steel panels and gradually replacing them with a mixture of aluminium and transparent PVC panels.
By the time I had completed that task the place was already looking better, and I had started sleeping there at night, my bed consisting of two scaffolding planks and a sleeping bag.
It rained heavily on a couple of days and I was glad to find that my roof was watertight, though I did have to realign some of the exterior guttering.
I built a chimney breast at the flagstoned end of the building and installed a wood burning stove. I purchased an old ceramic sink and installed that, the waste outlet being connected to the centre drainage channel (which I covered with pieces of flag stone I had cut to perfect size with a stihl saw) and was fed by a single cold water tap, it being a relatively simple matter to extend pipework that fed a neighbouring farmers water trough. (Oops, I never asked first).
I replaced the heavy wooden doors with new ones that I constructed myself, and though I built a small shed to house the generator outside the building and wired up two lights and a double socket point I also installed hooks and purchased half a dozen hurricane lamps.
Furniture I made from scaffolding planks and rough timber - a hard settee and chair, a coffee table, a dining table, two benches, a 'kitchen cabinet' and two cots, one double and one single. Upholstery seemed pretty pointless so I made large cushions, tailored to exact sizes needed, including large futon style cushions for the settee, and to use as mattresses on the cots.
A couple of brightly coloured and cheap rag rugs and cheaply bought second hand furniture (including a rocking chair and a couple of bookcases) and some houseplants, and I had an excellent and sizeable 'holiday home'. It had cost me less than £3,000 and had kept me occupied for two months.
I now began to work on the outside, relaying paths, scything back brambles and constructing a rough latrine shed, remembering my military engineering training. I finally liberated the slates, which it transpired were too damp and crumbly to have been used for roofing, though broken into fine chippings made a good ground cover for the beds where I introduced forsythia and buddleia, and those that were solid enough not to break I painted on in acrylics and hung on the walls inside my 'home from home'.
I found a rusty archaic looking plough in the brambles at the back of the building, and cleaned it up with a wire brush before dragging it to the front, where it lent an air of rustic charm and 'days gone by' to the whole picture, which was finally completed when I purchased a couple of ancient hay baskets and fastening them to the outside wall either side of the doors, filled them with moss, lobelia, nasturtiums and pansies.
It had been hard work and I had lost nearly 30 lbs in weight during the renovation, now was the time to relax, put my feet up, invite some friends and put some of that weight back on.
That first weekend I invited my sister, her husband and her kids (who camped out in the adjoining field which I owned). We had a great time sitting smoking marijuana and drinking wine in the late summer sun, sat up late playing chess and talking shit.
It was my own place, it was peaceful, it was idyllic. Nothing could take that away from me.
I entertained friends and family there until mid october when the nights got too cold for anyone to realistically enjoy camping outside. I checked on the place regularly throughout the winter except when the snow made it completely inaccessible, kept the generator running for half an hour on each visit and lit the wood stove, and the following year, in summer, many happy hours were spent there by many people.
The bombshell came just before Christmas. A letter from the highways department saying that they were building a road right through my land and were invoking a 'compulsory purchase order'.
The amount they gave me was pitifully small and I never saw a penny of it because it was all used up with hiring solicitors to fight the order.
And to add insult to injury, they changed their mind about the road and instead sold my land, and all the adjoining land, with planning permission for 200 homes to a private developer.
More writing and artwork at: rjpriceart.tribe.net/
"I am not mad"
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