A Year at the Chateau

by Dick Strawbridge

  I was on the hunt for baths again, but after my earlier very annoying and expensive bath saga I was definitely looking for items that ‘needed work’. The savings to be made were huge and France is bursting with gems in need of love. On a previous trip to Rennes I had spotted a brocante that looked very exciting. It’s always hard to say until you get close, but from the roadside I could see pallets of bricks, statues, lights, baths, pans, iron gates and railings. A bit of everything, in fact. It looked like they had cleared out some old houses and that was exactly what I was looking for. With just over four months until our wedding, I wanted to ensure that the honeymoon suite was ready and looking good.

  First, I needed a bath, and I had a romantic vision of a cast-iron roll-top bath with ornate claw feet. It was to go on the left-hand wall in the bathroom, next to the shower and looking out through the six-foot-tall windows onto the moat. One of the biggest problems with all the visual eye candy you can now find online is that you always see the ‘one’ but often then find out it’s an old photo or a one-off item sold in auction twenty years ago for thousands of pounds. I find it nearly impossible to find ‘the one’ and then find it for sale, so Dick and I have a rolling shopping list of items to keep our eye out for. We have been searching for a Rouen duck press for six years. I knew I had to manage my expectations. If I found a cast-iron bath of any kind I should be happy, I said to myself as I drove to the brocante that day.

  Arthur and Dorothy were with my parents that day as I wanted time to look around. Brocantes are different from Emmaus. In these markets, the jewels have already been selected and for that a premium is put on the price. I had dreams of it being like Spitalfields antique market in east London. I had spent many a Thursday noseying around Spitalfields and I knew many of the traders got their stock from France – and now I had direct access. I couldn’t wait.

  On arrival, I drove through a big cast-iron double gate with ten-foot statues of lions on either side (I had a quick word with myself to check this was not something to add to my shopping list. It was not). Next I drove past pallets of terracotta tiles, bricks and parquet flooring – there must have been upwards of fifty pallets. All good to know for the future. On the right, there were layers upon layers of cast-iron gates, fences and outdoor seats. And in every direction there were statues: angels, chickens, roosters, pigs and more lions. The place was gigantic and full, so the parking was minimal. There were spaces for just three cars and a tiny circle to turn round in to exit. I knew this would stress me out later but for now I just wanted to get inside.

  In front of a charming two-storey stone building, I found a thrifter’s paradise: tens of chipped enamel jugs and bowls, cutlery, benches, a whole row of sinks, toilets, vases. This was beauty. I could not wait to peek inside, but for the moment I had to keep my focus: I was looking for the perfect bath.

  Dick’s mum Jenny has two sayings she always repeats: ‘The harder you work, the luckier you get,’ and, ‘If it’s meant for you, it won’t go by you.’ I’m not sure which was in play that day, but just as I arrived, right by the front door, I spotted a spectacular bath. It was rotten and rusty, but it had the most beautiful roll-top and 30cm cast-iron claw feet. I couldn’t believe my eyes. The claw feet were more ornate and perfect than anything I had ever seen. I knew it needed work but that didn’t matter, the shape was perfect and big enough for two people (it was going in the honeymoon suite after all!). I quickly ran inside.

  As I entered the small wooden doorway, I was relieved that the kids were at home; every square inch of space was filled and piled high with china, glassware, linens, religious artefacts, guns, lights, pictures, mirrors. Every cabinet that was displaying the wares was for sale as well as every item inside them. It took every ounce of my focus not to stop. Eventually, I found the lady in charge, boxed in behind more glass cabinets. I waited by the counter for her attention. Every second that passed felt like an hour. First she was writing something, then she finished … and I waited. Then she put her pen back in the drawer and moved some bits around … very slowly. At that moment I couldn’t be quiet any more. Maybe she just couldn’t see me past the cabinets? ‘Bonjour,’ I uttered in a very cockney but happy tone. She looked up slowly and smiled. I tried to change my pace to suit the lady and softly asked if the bath was for sale (well, at least, I think that’s what I said). Dick and I have been told that it takes two years to change your pace when you move to France. Five years in and I’m sure we are quicker than ever, or we try to be, but I know for sure I definitely wasn’t operating at French pace that day. We finally got to the bath after much gesticulating and it was for sale – and the best bit about it: it was only €125. Luck was on my side that day!

  Mission completed, I had time to peruse. The brocante was fascinating and full of so much similar stuff to that which we had inherited in our own château: magazines, newspapers, enamel jugs, daybeds, cots and clothes galore. I tried to buy the bits we didn’t have at the Emmaus because they were so cheap, but this place had everything we could ever need, plus lots more that I never knew we needed!

  And then I spotted the globe de mariage*. I had seen one of these once before in Spitalfields. It was selling for £500, which I could never have afforded, but I’d always dreamt of finding another one. And this one was just €85. Bargain. I had to have it.

  Then, on my way out, I spotted another bath, not as nice as the first but still very elegant and ideal for one of the other future suites at the château. With that, my shopping was done and I even managed to get delivery of the baths arranged for the following day.

  It can be argued that there are very good reasons why cast-iron baths are no longer the norm for a modern bathroom. None of those reasons are about the aesthetics. They do look good and there is a degree of permanency, as they are built to last – even if the last fifty years of the bath’s life may be spent outside servicing the animals, after the enamel is no longer acceptable for human bottoms. When Angela found the first of her old baths, I know categorically that she did not even think about how it would be restored, she would just have had a vision of it completed and looking wonderful. Of course, knowing how much we had to pay for the bath in our suite she rightly assessed that there was a lot of scope to pay for restoration and still save money on a new cast-iron bath. Even lower on her list of practical observations would have been how to plumb it in, get a matching plug or get it up five or six flights of stairs … I did get my own way in insisting we move it the minimum distance until it was restored and its final destination was known (and that didn’t mean a rough idea of where it was going. It meant knowing where the plug and taps were going to be and the exact position of the beautiful claw feet).

  We managed to manhandle the bath into what was going to be our kitchen in the sous sol, just the two of us. Obviously, it would have been impossible for the two of us to carry the bath, but by setting it on a remover’s blanket and with a lot of pushing and pulling, and lifting one corner at a time, we got it into what was to be our family kitchen.

  As the centre of activities for the staff of the château, the floor had become worn, where for over a century working feet had moved between the stove, the hand pump for water, the large sink for preparing vegetables and the pantry and cold room. Like every other room, it had been cleared out and brushed down so all that was left was the bare bones of the room. We had been very excited by the original solid-fuel stove we had found in the kitchen. The firebox would have taken wood from the estate and it would have been used for cooking for every function at the château. It had a lovely stamp on it saying it had been made in Laval and, though it did look very tired, we had great hopes for it … Sadly, when we cleaned it, it disintegrated. It had truly been held together by the thin layer of enamel. All the metal had rusted into nothing and wiping it caused it to crumble. We couldn’t even lift it up as the top came away and the four sides imploded, so it had been shovelled out and replaced by the Rayburn. The chimney recess that had housed the original stove was conv
eniently situated near the dumb waiter that would rush up dishes to the service kitchen adjacent to the dining room. In an older plan, it looked as if there was a bread oven in the pantry behind the stove, but we found no evidence of it.

  The layout of the château had been well thought through and one of the things we found to be very special was the fact that everything ‘flowed’ so well. If you consider any activity we may wish to conduct in the château, certain facilities are required, and these facilities have to be relatively close to one another or it all becomes very difficult. For example, if the main reception room is separated from the dining room it becomes awkward when moving from one to the other after aperitifs at the start of the evening or to retire from the table after eating. Similarly, food has to be served at its best so the kitchen and dining room need to be thoughtfully situated. We had it all and even though not a lot was functioning, we could clearly see what was going to be in the future.

  At this point, our kitchen, which we would need to have fully working before the wedding, was an empty shell and we hadn’t even allowed ourselves to talk about the design as we’d had other priorities. However, it was the perfect location to work on bath restoration as it did not have many people pass through it and it was spacious. It was just important for it to be clear in plenty of time to get the kitchen done.

  My trips to America finished on a high – I had been mining for gold in Oregon and being a lumberjack in Washington State. And yet returning to the Mayenne was like being granted my freedom. All I had to do was work on the château for the rest of the year – after that, who knew what would happen. It was great to be home, especially as I knew this time I would not be leaving again. I was able to walk around and fully appreciate how beautiful the setting was and how lucky we were. With Dorothy on my knee and Arthur cuddled up beside me, Angel produced a couple of wonderful mugs of tea and we sat down to simply enjoy being together.

  As every Brit knows, tea abroad tends to be an abomination. In America they don’t quite get it, and lots of people drink it ice cold with flavouring added. In France, when you order a thé they bring it with lemon and if you ask for milk they look at you as if you are a little odd. They then seem to really want to give you warm milk – what is that about? It also never quite brews into proper tea. Maybe it’s the tea in the actual bag? It gives the semblance of being British by using English words, but maybe the water is not hot enough? Or maybe it’s because they tend not to use a teapot? Maybe it’s the milk that they put in too early – is it actually milk? Whatever the reasons, we learnt very early on that to have a good cup of tea you need to make it yourself with tea imported from home! We like tea and have many different makes and blends in stock, as you would expect in a château housing a notable tea party hostess. We also have a supply of Tetleys or PG Tips at hand that runs into hundreds, if not thousands, of teabags. We sometimes have cups and saucers with a teapot and milk jug but if we are working we opt for fine, straight-sided, bone china mugs. It tastes different and, interestingly, neither of us like the mugs that flare wider at the top (little details like this allow us to believe we were made for each other). We discuss lots over a cup of tea and from a very early age both children have joined us with a weaker, cooler, sweeter brew, that allows us all the opportunity to conduct the ritual of tea and cake – or, now in France, thé and patisseries.

  With the family united in the château once more, it didn’t take us long to discuss what we had achieved and where we were in our restoration. We’d done so much and, amazingly, we’d managed to keep the momentum going despite the separation. We had the infrastructures for our heating and plumbing and electricity in. We knew what was going where and the routes of the electric cables; waste, hot and cold water and heating were all established. There was lots more to do but we had the skeleton of our system sorted. It was messy, though. In many rooms we had holes in our walls that looked like huge rock-boring rats had been making themselves at home. The routes for the electricity had been chased out of the walls in many rooms, though we had limited the number of sockets in an attempt to minimise the devastation. Our family’s suite was functioning and safe. And we also had a couple of functioning rooms upstairs on the fourth level (called the second floor).

  The whole naming system of the floors in the château appeared to be there to confuse you. The basement or the sous sol was basically three steps down from the level of the land – all very sensible. When approached from the outside, the second level was up a sweeping set of granite steps; fourteen on each side leading to an amazing front door. This level, the rez-de-chaussée, was the ground floor. The next level up, the third, was the first floor. After that, four levels up, was the second floor. Then on the fifth level was the attic, or the grenier. Then, just to make it all very clear, the sixth and final level was actually an attic.

  The entrance hall, the salon and the dining room had all been stripped of unwanted paint and wallpaper and some of the electricity was nearly ready to connect. There is always a low point before you start to reconstruct. Unfortunately for us, we hadn’t even reached the lowest point and we hadn’t been hanging around. Making good was going to take a lot of effort.

  We were sitting looking at each other, trying to concentrate on the positives and our achievements, when the penny dropped: the clock that had been ticking was halfway to our wedding deadline. We didn’t actually panic but there was a very definite, if unspoken, ‘Oh f***!’ There was nothing for it – we would have to cut back on our sleep, which is not easily done as we had young children who slept like a nocturnal tag team. The candles would be burnt at both ends.

  I was jumping daily from feeling really motivated and focused on a project to feeling frightfully overwhelmed. The trick was not to think too far ahead as the worry halts you. Instead, you need to focus on the project in front of you. In practice, this worked. Dick often says, and I’m sure he will mention this once or twice in this book, ‘You eat an elephant a bite at a time.’ I really understood this, but the issue was I did need to think ahead because I had to order bathroom suites and ensure things were planned. I’m an organised list person but the pure scale of the messy jobs that still needed to be done was terrifying at times. Dick could hear my frustration. We were just so far off starting any pretties. If I started anything, it would soon be trashed – the grubby work was still in full flow.

  We took control of this and a ‘grubby’ worksheet was started and attached to each door. This allowed Dick and I to see exactly where we were on each of the suites, but still the seed was sown: what we initially thought in January would be done by now would obviously not all be completed in time for the wedding.

  We needed to know where we were in our work in each room. Now we had taken stock of what had to be done, it was just a matter of doing it all. Sounds easy, but most of the château still felt like a building site and the mess was positively wearing.

  On the more positive side, summer had arrived, we had enough baths – even if they weren’t good enough to use yet – and my days of working in America had finally come to an end so all of our efforts could now be dedicated to the château.

  * * *

  * A globe de mariage is a traditional French wedding gift that was popular in the mid-nineteenth century. Originally it was used to collect the bride’s wedding bouquet. Later the beautiful glass bell jar became a popular way of containing and protecting other wedding souvenirs.

  chapter seven

  JULY

  Through our first spring and summer in the château it hardly ever seemed to rain. There was definitely very little between April and October. We had moved south but we didn’t know how hot it would be. We had spent some time during summer visits much further south and were very aware that it was hard to work and remain productive with temperatures in the thirties or forties. When the temperatures reached the thirties in London, we found it nearly impossible to breathe as even the buildings were giving off heat. With all that in mind, and particularly now we had focu
sed on what we really had to get done before the wedding, we were a little anxious about what it would be like come summer. Plus we had the moat – were we going to be overwhelmed by mosquitoes and midges?

  Thankfully, the heat has never been truly debilitating at the château. The same mechanism that makes the château hard to heat up keeps it cool. The thick stone walls are slow to respond to the vagaries of the weather. In addition, the shutters really do help. On the south side of the château, there are slatted external shutters that can be closed to keep out direct sunshine, but with the windows open inside the shutters there is movement of air that, even if it is not cool, is welcome. If it all becomes too much, then a trip to the basement, where all the floors of the caves (the wine and cider cellars) are rammed earth and therefore naturally regulated, will soon help you cool down. None of that helps, however, if you have to work.

  When it comes to our fear of mosquitoes and biting insects, we have been very pleasantly surprised by the complete lack of a problem. We are fortunate enough to have an ecosystem that seems to be in balance. We do have plenty of insects but they have lots of predators. In the larval stage when the insects are in the moat there are lots of fish – and let’s not forget that we have toads and frogs too. When the insects leave the water, they are subjected to an aerial bombardment day and night. Swallows, dragonflies and other ‘hawkers’ are abundant during the daylight hours and as dusk arrives so does a cloud of bats … We love them all. Dragonflies have been surprisingly wonderful as they patrol above the water to pick off the emerging flying insects – with colours so vibrant you have to do a double take to see what is there.

  At the beginning of July I realised that we hadn’t taken any time off just for ourselves. The château and my trips back and forth across the Atlantic had been all-consuming. So Angela decided to fix that by organising a short break away for the four of us while the château was being sprayed and treated to ensure no woodworm or boring creatures would be dining on our structure. The idea was wonderful – but a relaxing break to … Disneyland? There are very few times that ‘relaxing’ and ‘Disney’ work in the same sentence and to make it even more interesting and a ‘home from home’ experience, after my survival series in America, we stayed at a log cabin in Davy Crockett land.