A dramatic revival

The decaying shell of a medieval peel tower has undergone a near miraculous restoration and revival as a family home. Jeremy Musson reports

- Jeremy Musson

THE 21st-century chapter in the story of Hellifield, near Skipton in Yorkshire, is as dramatic as any in its eight centuries of existence. It also shows how the courage of one family can change the destiny of a place that was once considered doomed. Architect Francis Shaw and his wife, Karen, took on the picturesque, unstable ruin of the tower in 2004, then, over three years, always retaining the quality of the building’s ancient exterior, transformed it into a stylish modern home. The building they began work on, uninhabited since the late 1940s, had been stripped of much of its interior detailing and was literally crumbling away. Looking at it today, the idea that this comfortable tower house was once listed on the English Heritage ‘Buildings at Risk’ register, entirely roofless, with trees growing out of the walls, seems incredible.

The restoration was so complex that the project became something of a cause célèbre on the television series Grand Designs, with a broadcast in 2007 followed, unusually, by a sequel in 2009. At Hellifield Peel, the Shaws reinstalled the tower’s interior storey levels and re-created finishes and detailing in a sympathetic manner, with carved stone and joinery reminiscent of the work of Lutyens at Penheale Manor, Cornwall, Lindisfarne Castle, Northumberland, and Castle Drogo, Devon (COUNTRY LIFE, May 17 and 24). Some mullioned windows have been carefully restored, but the Shaws retained window openings that had been inserted in the late 18th century, creating new sashes to fit them, rather than speculative reconstructions of medieval windows.