It's all in the name

Why the "House in the Enchanted Forest"?  Wanting some early advice, I described the house to the Council's Conservation Officer: "it's the one which is set back from the road, opposite the church in the town centre, the left hand of a pair of Victorian semis".  Her immediate response was "ah, the one in the enchanted forest!"

The house as we first saw it

It was quite an appropriate description really; the right hand half of the two-storey house looks lived-in, well-maintained and loved, but the left hand half, which had attracted my interest, was anything but.  The front left hand corner of the house was covered by ivy which extended over a good deal of the front roof, but the vendors had just chopped a foot or so out of the base of this greenery, revealing stems as thick as my arms, and leaves were just starting to yellow and fall.  The front garden on the left was full of impenetrable shrubbery and trees, including laurel, fir and ash.  This extended back past the side of the house where, surprisingly, the garden widened across what should have been next door's garden.  This area was so densely covered that the far wall was not even visible, but it appeared to be perhaps 10m away from the house.  Holly, apple, pear, blackberry, buddleia and elder all mixed with vicious hawthorn and, in the distance, some species probably unknown to man.  In order to display the house to "advantage", the vendor had paid someone to go along the side of the house with a chainsaw, rather like an explorer hacking his way through the African jungle, thus permitting access to the back.

After finding this "opportunity" on a property website on a Monday evening, I tried Google maps but the aerial photo just showed a roof and lots of greenery, while Streetview did not have a discernible house at all! The next morning I looked around the outside, guessing that there was no-one resident. Externally there was evidence of poor maintenance and much damp, if that is the right word for actual holes in the slate roof. One downpipe was fractured and rainwater had been pouring down the wall; the other downpipe was intended for a water butt which had been replaced by an old and corroded galvanized cold water tank, and the water just went straight out again. Peering through the original (?) sash windows, however, showed an attractive hall and dining room with red and black floor tiles and high ceilings.

Suitably encouraged, I walked up to the market place to find the agents for more details. Before I had really grasped what I was doing, I had booked to view inside. Come Thursday morning, we were pleased to find that the interior was actually better than we had guessed. Upstairs, there's a lot of falling plaster but the floorboards seemed to be in good condition (OK, I know the joists might prove to be a disappointment); there were three good-sized bedrooms and a small bathroom as well. It was also true that you could see the sky through at least two holes in one bedroom ceiling!, but the missing plaster did show some nice riven laths, probably chestnut.

Our dream house?

Other than being listed and not detached, the house was everything that I had ever dreamed of as an old property project; we wanted somewhere stone-built in the centre of an attractive village, but with space to the side and set back from the road as we wanted off-street parking. We didn't fancy front doors opening directly into the living space - Jane likes a good hall as an entrance - nor were we too keen on small rooms with low ceilings in the typical cottage. We also wanted decent transport links, and Jane still has to travel often to London, and she likes having good shops readily available. Here we were minutes from the shops in the town centre with the station for trains to London not much further.

It was time to make up our minds and put our money where our dreams were taking us.