While vacationing, Nicole and Gav decided they “might as well” view some smallholdings for sale to simply indulge in a dream they had long carried. They were attracted to a 13-acre smallholding in west Wales, with a crumbling farmhouse and a yard full of derelict outbuildings.
The couple immediately fell in love with it and put an offer down right away. “It was on for significantly more than we could afford because it had a huge acreage,” Nicole said. “But when we came to see it they said it was not selling so they would be willing to split the land.”
When they finally got the keys they aimed to start work straightaway, juggling their full-time jobs with restoring the buildings and tackling the overgrown acres.
They bought a caravan which would become home for the foreseeable future. Their first priority was getting the farmhouse up and running so they could move in as soon as possible.
Gav, a carpenter by trade, said “This has been quite a big learning curve. The plan was to come in and just use modern building techniques like celotex insulation and cement render. But the more you dug in the more you realized we had to go down the traditional route using lime and breathable materials for the building.”
Nicole, who works in production and runs the couple’s YouTube account, said the pair received “some grief” online from people seemingly upset that they were “ripping down the walls” of the historic buildings.
Gav said: “A lot of the ceilings had water damage because a couple of the chimneys had been leaking. It was a case of getting those down and getting everything back to the bare bones really.
Nicole said: “We’ve made loads of progress. We’ve got the underfloor heating done, we’ve got the lime floor down, we’ve got started on some walls downstairs in the main house. We had massive amounts of rot where people had previously used cement instead of lime so we had a lot of beams that needed to be replaced. We replaced all the windows and we’ve had the back door put in – all that important stuff. And I thought: ‘This is a house now – not just a building site’.”
“With how our YouTube is going we have managed to get a bit of help and we might get some more help now that YouTube is going well. But at the start we just didn’t have the money to do that.”
As they have worked their way through the renovation so far the pair have uncovered some interesting details about the history of the farm, which dates back to circa 1900.
Gav said: “I’ve found some cool old tools and signed skirting boards where the original carpenters had signed the back of the old skirting boards. There are no dates unfortunately but it says their names. The last owner also kept diaries from the animal sales. One of the piggeries has got ‘1913’ or something branded on one of the beams.” But other than those few hints little is known about the farm’s past.
The couple said it’s important to them to honor the farmhouse’s history by keeping some of its original furniture and giving it a cozy Welsh cottage feel.
Nicole said: “The house was pretty gutted but we were left with a beautiful Welsh dresser and some beautiful Welsh furniture so the interior design will be based all around that. We just want to reuse as much as possible. Ideally, we don’t want to buy much new at all.”
The longer-term goal will be to make use of land so that the pair can live as self-sufficiently as possible. Nicole said: “Gav’s really interested in regenerative farming. We are looking at ways we could do rotation with the animals to make the best use of the land and bring nutrients back in. I really want to have a big veg garden and have flowers – that kind of thing. Hopefully we can do all the home food methods like canning and storing our food. We will never be totally self-sufficient, but it would be nice to live a simpler life.”
You can read the original article at www.walesonline.co.uk