I am assured it's all going to plan

Flooding from a broken cistern ruined the hall decoration.  Unfortunately when the paper was stripped back the underlying plaster was badly damaged and concerns over the state of a 220 year old wooden joist were raised by the surveyor.

The house is filthy tonight but the good news is that the joist is fine and the additional significant cost which the insurers would not cover is unnecessary.

The extra image shows how the stripped stair looked this morning.