Quick Response

Friday, August 9th, 2024

I don’t go away very often, but when I do I always keep an eye out for anything that I might usefully implement here at Bressenden. While staying at a Premier Inn recently, I looked around my room for instructions to access the WiFi, or a code or password. I had not stayed in a hotel since the days when a hotel receptionist would hand you a piece of paper with log-in credentials scribbled on. The guest information leaflet told me to scan a square-shaped box that was filled with tiny black and white squares. I’ve never had to use one of these QR codes before, though they came into their own during the Covid pandemic. QR stands for Quick Response. Most adults now apparently own a smartphone or tablet with integrated camera and built-in software that is able to recognise and use QR codes.

I had no idea what I was supposed to do, or even whether I needed a special app. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. So I got the camera up on my phone and pointed it at the patterned box. A message came up inviting me to join the WiFi network, and that was it. How simple and convenient! It was so quick and easy, compared with fiddling about in my phone’s settings, choosing the correct network and inputting a password, that I decided to look into the possibility of having a similar system for use by Bressenden’s guests.

Back home, I set about finding out how to create a QR code. It was surprisingly straightforward and, best of all, it was free. I have now put QR codes in all the rooms — not just for accessing WiFi, but for phoning me or sending a message. This is easier than having to key in a phone number plus, for overseas guests, a country code.

Late Summer Lilies

Thursday, July 25th, 2024


Summer has been disappointingly cold and grey, with just a few warm and sunny days. There have been no hosepipe bans so far and the lawns and fields remain green. When the tiger and Nile lilies in the garden bloom, it is a sign that autumn will soon be upon us. Let us hope for an Indian summer.

Back to Normal

Saturday, July 6th, 2024

The new windows are all in, the scaffolding has been removed and everything is mostly back to normal. The guest rooms and breakfast room are fit to use once again. The only major piece of work outstanding concerns the stairwell and its flat roof above it. The former’s outside wall is saturated and will have to be replastered and painted. The roof needs to be recovered with fibreglass to replace the leaking, cracked felt that is beyond repair.

All of Bressenden’s windows have now been replaced save for those in the “new” kitchen, whose 1980s double-glazed windows still have life in them. I cannot overstate what a difference the new windows, both the wooden ones in the East Wing and the metal ones everywhere else, in the house have made. Mettherm’s aluminium replacements for the Crittall windows are airtight, well fitting, double-glazed, multipart locking, rustproof, maintenance-free replicas of cold, leaking, warped, wet (in winter), mould-prone, rusting, single-glazed eye-sores that were impossible to maintain and for which nothing could be done to improve their aesthetic appeal because paint never adhered for more than a few months before flaking off, and the frames kept collecting pools of condensation which encouraged the growth of black mould. Keeping around 100 windows and a few doors looking fresh was no joke. The most depressing thing when running a B&B in winter was the morning routine of vacuuming the breakfast windows which were dripping wet whenever the outside temperature went below 6 degrees. By the time you’d wiped off the last window you had to start all over again because the first window would have already misted up. With these new windows, shown in the photo above, I will be spared this work when winter arrives.

Taking a bathroom window as an example, what looked like this:

Now looks like this:

New Windows Everywhere

Tuesday, June 25th, 2024

The window replacement programme is nearing its final stage. There are just a few left to replace out of the 75. They look wonderfully authentic and far exceed my expectations. The two styles, Georgian panes on the south side and leaded panes to the north, replicate the original versions almost exactly, with a few adjustments made to tidy up the original mix of styles on the north facade and to reduce the number of opening windows and unneeded top vents, especially downstairs. All the windows on the north side are now leaded. The photo shows the two styles.

The last few windows are going in today and tomorrow after a busy day yesterday, with six men on site dealing with windows, two scaffolders moving bits of scaffolding around, and two ladies plastering and filling indoors. I also had guests due to arrive in the (unaffected) East Wing!

I am delighted with my new Arts & Crafts windows and cannot praise the Mettherm Windows team highly enough.

The First New Window

Wednesday, June 12th, 2024

New window

Yesterday the first new window was fitted. This is the first of 74 windows and one door which will installed over the coming fortnight. The original windows are draughty single-glazed Crittall steel windows, warped and rusted with old age. They produce buckets of condensation in winter and encourage the growth of mould. They are a nightmare to maintain because modern lead-free paint simply does not adhere to them. Some are more than one hundred years old as they were sourced from reclamation yards when the upper floor of the house was rebuilt in 1948 following a devastating fire caused by a lightning strike. Crittall still makes steel windows, but they cost a fortune, and the properties of steel are such that rust will always be a risk. Aluminium windows are rust-proof, almost maintenance-free, more affordable and have a better thermal rating than modern steel windows. They only became an option relatively recently when the “thermal break” technology was perfected. Their slim profile matches that of the steel originals. It wouldn’t be possible to replicate the character of these windows with plastic or wooden versions, since they require much thicker frames, thus limiting the size of glazed area. In a house surrounded on all sides by mature and very tall trees, we need all the light we can get.

Here’s a comparison of new and old. The new one is on the left and the old is on the right. A pretty good match, I’d say!

The Room With a View

Wednesday, May 15th, 2024

Mid-week, mid-May and mid-rhododendron season. This view from the breakfast room on 2nd May has become more spectacular every day since. This year’s display of rhododendrons and azaleas has more than made up for last year’s rather poor show, with big splashes of colour exploding like fireworks in slow motion all over the garden. Here is a small selection of photos from the past fortnight.











Scarifying Day

Monday, April 22nd, 2024

Today is Scarifying Day at Bressenden. The sun dial lawn and the back lawns are being treated to a thorough scratching, combing and grooming session with a scarifier hired for the day. Unbelievable amounts of moss are being raked up. We hope the grass will be breathing more easily as a result. The rhododendrons are bursting into flower.

Goldcrest

Saturday, April 21st, 2024

Today, this Goldcrest, Europe’s tiniest species of bird, made several visits to the rotten sill of one of the windows that will be replaced in July. It gave me a rare opportunity to see the little creature at close quarters, as unlike tits, nuthatches, robins and woodpeckers, it does not come to bird feeders. Here is a video of the little bird. Its mate in the nearby tree looked on but didn’t join it.

Magnificent Magnolia

Friday, March 22nd, 2024

As winter slowly recedes, encouraging bulbs, tree blossom, heather and primroses to add their delicate touches of colour throughout the garden, the big old magnolia tree down by the roadside is now at its peak of flowering. Soon the clocks will go forward and we can enjoy more daylight and look forward to the long-awaited wisteria and rhododendron blooms.

Blooming Winter

Thursday, February 15th, 2024


Those who dare to cross the spongy wet bog that should be a garden lawn will be rewarded with the sight of not just camelia blooms, which are to be expected at this time of the year, but also a few rhododendron flowers, albeit small and undernourished in appearance. I have never seen these in February before, and we’re still nowhere near the end of the month. It feels more like April this week.