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Barns and Redundant Farm Buildings

With changes in farming practices, and in economic conditions. many traditional farm buildings have become redundant.

They can be in timber-frame, stone or brick and in many forms and sizes, from single barns to complete farm layouts.

Recent amateur conversions have caused the introduction of very restrictive Planning legislation. Nevertheless, it is still possible to devise practical and imaginative conversion schemes on which to negotiate approvals.

Apart from legislative constraints, old buildings often have a unique personality which can be adapted to form new character. Care and ingenuity can make use of many existing features and often retain most of the existing openings.

Walls and roofs can be lined to give good standards of insulation, and as many modern amenities can he introduced as may he wanted. The cost of conversion is less than building new, and there is the opportunity to create something new yet old. individual and special.

Various design guides have been published, but there is no substitute for a real Architect working on an actual building, devising real and appropriate solutions in collaboration with a caring owner.

We can help you with

Inspecting groups of redundant farm buildings or individual barns and advising on their potential and possible uses.

Negotiating with the Planning Authorities on your behalf - with the experience of other cases and awareness of their anxieties and how to meet them.

Assessing costs realistically. (Laymen often dismiss a building as beyond repair or, in other cases, grossly under-estimate the costs.)

Designing schemes, making all the necessary applications, obtaining tenders, appointing contractors, and seeing through the works proper execution and checking final accounts.

Our experience includes

Working on a variety of old farm huildings in stone, timber-frame and brick -

Conversion schemes for making lettable holiday accommodation, houses for sale and a grandfather flat convertable to later student accommodation.

For converting a large threshing barn to a son’s own unit with a flying-walkway between the two-storey accommodation at each end, linking small barns, and converting a large timber-frame barn to an up-market executive residence.

Converting farm out-buildings to a small hotel, and extending existing brick buildings to create the HQ offices for the National Field Studies council - after conducting a feasibility study to examine several possible courses of action when faced with leaving their London offices.