House in a Box

Its been one of those weeks where the weather has been glorious whilst at work, then decidely dimmer at the weekend.  It was pretty grey and uninspiring today, but we both felt like getting out of the house.  Following our first trip to Helensburgh (crikey, was that really over two years ago?!) I found out that the Natural Trust run Hill House is inside a box of mail for conservation purposes.  So I've been keen to go back for a while and look at the box.

Hill House was designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh for his pal who was big in the publishing business.  The interior is rather beautiful with dark wood panelling, customer wallpaper, Mackintosh prints, furniture and artwork. I'm not a fan of a lot of the 'Mackintosh replica' art and tourist gifty things that you see, but the house is really beautiful and gave me an appreciation for the style.

The problem with the house is that the phrase style over substance' really applies, and Mr. Mackintosh used the new and exciting method of concrete render to cover the house, on top of the red sandstone common to the area.  He thought that the concrete would make everything watertight and keep the house safe, alas, he was wrong and over the years water has seeped in through the cracks in the concrete and caused quite a bit of damage to the interior.

The National Trust have since been finding ways to  dry the house out and keep it dry.  The current solution has been to erect a box around the house with a solid roof and then sides made of mail (like what knights used to wear).  The box stops rain from hitting the house and making it wetter, but also allows air to circulate to help dry it out.  The temperature inside is controlled rigourously, with sensors all over the house, the prevent further cracking.  I think that the box also makes the house much more interesting, plus you get to walk around and above it which gives you a fun insight to a bit of a building you wouldn't normally see.  

One of the rooms contained polaroid-style pictures of the house hung from the ceiling, where visitors were asked what they thought of how to conserve the house going forward.  There was a lot of support for the box: "Keep the box", "Box! Box! Box!", "Never get rid of box" and simply "BOX!". Although someone , possibly a neighbour in one of the very large, very posh looking houeses nearby said "The box needs to go, it's been an eyesore to neighbours for long enough".  I'm with the box people.

Kudos to volunteer Liz who showed us onto the walkway and explained about the next restoraton steps.  They have recently got permissions to remove the concrete render, which will then allow the house to breathe more and dry out, before re-rendering in a material more suitable for the climate in a way that is as faithful as possible to the original design.  Once complete, the box will then be dismantled.  I think the box really adds to the story of the house and was glad to see it whilst the box was in place.   If you want to see the box, and my blip doesn't do it enough justice, Tom Scott has a great short video about it.

After the trip to see the box, we had a stroll along the coast with a chippy tea/lunch and fed the crows. We spotted oystercatchers, curlews, ringed plovers and a small flock of Eiders.  All in all a nice day.