A Lovely Pair of Knockers!

When we were mooching about Marylebone Lane looking for The Button Queen, we happened across an old fashioned iron mongers (David Penton and Sons) and I saw the perfect door knockers for WBP in the window. They were just what we had been looking for (for quite a while).

Each measures 23cm (9") in diametre, and weighs quite a lot being solid brass. We managed to smuggle them back to the antipodes in our hand luggage despite their weight.

Yesterday I set to designing a suitable front door with gold detailing on a high gloss black lacquer base to show off the knockers. The black and gold is in keeping with the park's signage and logo, and I think it is quite chic. Here is the mock up...

Transplanting trees with a Tree Spade...

When we had the base course for the drive put down, and the entrance block work put up, it became clear that the plane trees we planted 3 years ago were quite a way off centre with where the drive ended up being placed. Also, over the 3 years it became clear that some of the trees were growing at different rates. So, we had a tree spade come in to dig up all the trees, swap them all around so that the heights were more balanced, and place them  very accurately and symmetrically on either side of the drive (within an inch or two).

Above: A photo taken of the trees last year. One wouldn't want to dig out 30 of these with a spade and shift them by hand. The other good thing about the tree spade is that all the bulbs which were planted around the base of the trees were transplanted as well.

Above: Tree spade cutting the hole
Below: Planting the trees

Below: Newly placed trees

Entrance Progress...

This is the second of three posts chronicling our entrance's progress. This post covers from the laying of the foundations to the completion of the block work. The next post will show the finished wall and post box prior to the wrought iron gates being fitted.

Above: The masonry blocks arrived

Below: The trenches were dug out for our foundations

They were then filled with concrete...

Once the foundations had hardened the block work started...

The block work is reinforced with iron rods from the foundations to the caps, and then filled internally with concrete, making them incredibly solid and strong enough to withstand a car crash or similar. We were not going to have the average walls, into which vandals could kick holes etc.

Above: You can see the smaller retaining wall in front of the main wall for the soil for the box hedge garden.

Now they are busy placing all the capitals and coping. We designed the capitals and coping ourselves, and then our builders made wooden prototypes before creating latex molds to cast as many caps as we need. The next step will be for the whole wall to be rendered in plaster and then coloured to resemble sandstone.

Above: Before

Below: After (so far)

Meanwhile, on the other side of the road, the power company was installing  new power pole and transformer, and then thrust-boring the cables under the road, eventually into a circuit box hidden behind our front wall.

Inside the digger has removed several tonnes of top soil and replaced it with bedrock for the driveway. The driveway is Ca. 250 yards long and 6 yards wide...

Above and Below: The straight part of the driveway, looking back from the first curve towards the entrance. The straight part will be lined on either side with an avenue of plane trees. We planted the trees 3 years ago, but will need to get in a hydraulic tree-spade to shift them this winter, to realign them perfectly symmetrically on either side of the drive, as its course is not where we had originally planned.

Above: Middle straight heading towards second curve

Below: Looking back at  second curve

Below: The last corner /third curve before it straightens northward into the front courtyard...

A video of the first dive down our driveway...

The Entrance Begins...

And so, the work on the entrance has begun. It started with removing the fence along the road frontage, removing the Black Walnut tree to the left of the driveway, re-centring the driveway (which will involve shifting the avenue of plane trees 3m to the left this winter), and starting to put in the footings for the wall.

Above and Below: The Black Walnut tree

Above and Below: Removing the Leiland hedge (Temporarily) which I had planted on the day of the royal wedding.

Below: The Walnut being felled...

Above: Morning

Below: Next Afternoon

It was a shame that the Black Walnut had to go. I don't like cutting down trees, but it was right in the way, and it was quite old (branches would usually fall down during high winds). It will be replaced by a pair of weeping willows on either side of the entrance. But to assuage my guilt further, I called the local wood turners' association and offered the wood to them. Black Walnut can make some stunning pieces, and it would have only ended up as firewood otherwise...

 

 Above: Planks of Black Walnut

Below: Some turned Black Walnut

 Pity there was not quite enough to make a black walnut counter top...

A Grand Opening...

This week we finally broke ground on the first building project at Willowbrook - The Entrance. We had spent a lot of time researching and designing the wrought iron gates and the entrance walls. We started looking at a few entrance concepts a couple of years ago (previous post on gate ideas).

We wanted the gates to be suitable impressive and elegant without being over the top. The over the top option was excluded by council bylaws anyway, which state that gates may not be more than 2 metres high. So, we made sure the highest point of the gate was at 2m, and then worked backwards...

The scrolling top for the gate was based on a gate in London that I had taken a photo of, near Kew Gardens:

It is of course made of cast iron, but we will manage to execute a similar effect with forged iron. The gate above, however, was only about 2.5m wide, and our gate had to be 5m wide to allow for commercial vehicles to come in and out during the construction. So we elongated the design, and placed scalloped sections on either side of the gate, so that the scroll work didn't loose too much of its proportions.

Above: The idea for the scalloped sections.

Then we had to decide about styles of pillar...

Above: These were my favourite pillars, with the curved mouldings at the top which will match the curved moulding on the front of the manor house architrave.

Urns and finials seem to be popular for atop the pillars, but we had already sourced some stone lions from Gloucestershire for the job...

Other Pillars and toppers...

Then we had to decide upon which way the walls would curve.

Inwards...

or outwards...

 or not at all...

We went for the first choice, as curving inwards allows us to have more space for gardens, and also for vehicles to pull in off the road.

Below is my plan for the gardens around the entrance - formal with a variety of shades of green, and differing heights. The Leilandii hedge running along the front of the property with tuck in behind the front wall and grow about 2 feet taller than the wall. This will add security, and continuity with the rest of the front hedge, and will allow the perpendicular hornbeam hedges to be grown to the same same height without being seen end-on from the road. 

For scale, the driveway is 5 metres wide, with the plane trees being shown at their current size. Their canopies will eventually drape over the outermost third of the driveway, creating a dramatic avenue visible from the road. The Willows will be planted just outside of the hornbeam hedges, so that their trunks will not be visible from the pedestrian gates, and they will cascade over the front wall on either side, flanking the entrance.

An example of a 2 tiered retaining wall with a garden sandwiched in the middle...

Next: where to put the pedestrian gates? 

It seems traditional to have them on the main frontage, on either side of the vehicular gate. We, however, have decided to sit them at 90 degrees to the main gate, just inside the front wall. This will allow us to place an ornamental focal point against the hornbeam hedging, in the direct line of sight from the pedestrian gates for added interest, and means that the pedestrian gate is next to the post box.

We had already found the lights that we liked, which are similar to these below...

We feel that the lights had to be large enough to really stand out, esp as the whole gate and wall had been scaled back to meet local regulations. Little lamps, although sweet, would not cut it...

Then decisions about letter box placement. We decided to incorporate it into the pillar of the wall closest to the road, so that the postman could easily access it from the car window. Having rural delivery means that if you have a flag attached to the box, you can both receive and send mail from your box - very convenient in the country. Our Architect designed a fold away brass lever system to pop the flag in and out of a slot in the pillar.

 and finally, to gild or not to gild?

Solid gold would look far too ostentatious and attract the wrong sort of attention, but a subtle gold crest painted on a black background would be stylish without being gaudy. Hence keeping the circle in the scrolling top of the gate just like at Kew...

I look forward to sharing mores pictures with you as it progresses.