We have decided to start recording more regularly. We have had so many messages from people asking what we are doing that it felt like the right moment to begin a weekly series. This is the first of those entries, where we will talk through our week and the projects we are tackling.
This weekend’s main focus has been the hunting lodge, the building where we held our Christmas party. Not long after the event, we realised something was wrong with the floor. It had buckled so badly that it looked like a skateboard ramp, with the table visibly pushed upwards. We suspect a combination of a very hot summer followed by a wet winter caused moisture or tree roots to expand beneath the tiles.
Zion spent four full days lifting, cleaning, and relaying the tomette tiles. Many of them were broken, so he had to source replacements from the old farmhouse building. It was physically exhausting work, with hours spent bent over on hands and knees.
The tomette tiles themselves are beautiful, handmade clay tiles and very porous. Ours came from the farmhouse, which dates back to around 1100, making it far older than the château itself, which was built in 1872. Zion carefully relaid them in the hunting lodge, matching the original pattern as closely as possible.
Once the floor was finished, another issue emerged. A suspicious patch on the roof prompted us to borrow a cherry picker from a friend to investigate more closely. What we found was far worse than expected. What we thought might be a small repair turned into a major problem, at the worst possible time, with a wedding approaching and very little margin for delay.
The pressure makes it feel as though we are constantly putting out fires. To repair the roof properly, we need Mars tiles, which are difficult to find in France and can cost up to €300 each if they are specialist venting tiles. Some of the roof joists were so rotten that Zion had to make templates and copy the original shapes to replace them accurately.
The weather has not helped. We start the day with sunshine, begin work, and then the rain arrives. Even now, as this is being recorded, it is spitting with rain after the long process of setting up the camera.
We also made a trip to collect horse manure from a friend to prepare for the vegetable garden. At the moment, the garden itself does not yet exist, but having the manure certainly creates motivation to get started. I have been planting seeds, because if I stay inside dealing with paperwork, we simply will not have vegetables ready in time for the season.
That trip came with its own challenge. Zion took the van and a borrowed trailer to collect the manure and promptly got stuck in the mud. So now we have a trailer full of manure firmly embedded in wet ground, thanks to the relentless rain. The next step is to draw up a proper plan for where the garden will be dug and planted.
Alongside all of this, we have been switching constantly between tasks, including a lot of painting to prepare the château for the wedding. Zion has also taken on what we jokingly call his role as the “mould king”. He is creating a mould for the garden balustrades. The originals are old and beautiful, and while ready-made moulds exist, none match the specific profile of ours. We want the garden details to echo the architecture of the château, so he is determined to finish this mould before time runs out.
Our aim is to share something every week and document our château life as honestly as possible. We just have to keep moving.
There are moments when it is a real struggle, but each stage is still enjoyable. Often, instead of spending half a day travelling to buy materials, Zion will find a piece of wood in the barn and adapt it for what we need.
As we keep reminding ourselves, this really is a château on a shoestring. Moving from the UK to France and learning where to source the right materials has been a challenge, but despite everything, we love this life and wouldn’t change it.