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3 October 2024
Farming in Protected Landscape (FiPL) funding came to the rescue of a traditional barn, that needed repairing urgently.
A much loved feature of the Lake District, barns are found in every settlement and valley. Many are in active use today. Barns not only demonstrate the agro-pastoral practices for which the Lake District was inscribed as a World Heritage Site; they also provide valuable habitats for owls, bats, birds and other small mammals.
The barn at Low Fell End farm, with its Grade II listed 17th century farmhouse, and other farm buildings tell a story of how farmers adapt and add to their farmsteads over many centuries. The buildings flex around changing farming needs.
Without ongoing repairs and maintenance, many barns, would be lost. In this instance there was a dangerously bulging wall, water was coming in through the roof which meant that some key parts of its wooden roof structure needed replacing. It was also next to a public footpath.
The grant, and support from the LDNPA, helped Ken and Linda to conserve and secure the future of a traditional farm building. Ken’s family have farmed at Low Fell End since 1950 and now his daughter and son-in-law are farming here. It should support agricultural use for many generations to come.
At Low Fell End the barn is approximately 30 metres long, with five areas or ‘rooms’. The barn has been used, and continues to be used, for housing livestock over the winter, storing hay and providing a dog kennel for the farm’s working sheepdogs.
A first round of FiPL funding paid for expert surveys on the building’s condition and structural soundness. Archaeological and wildlife studies were also commissioned. With this information a schedule of work was drawn up and costed.
Within ten months of this, at the end of 2023, local builders were on site to start work. Tasks included stripping the roof, taking down and rebuilding the bulging wall, replacing an oak truss, beam and lintels, as well as putting in new rafters. The penultimate task, and weather permitting to allow the lime mortar to set, is to lay the salvaged slates on the roof. And then, in Spring, gutters and down pipes can be added to ensure good water shedding.
It’s a project that brings wider benefits too. This specialised work creates employment, supports local economies and sustains craft skills. Repairing existing buildings, using local materials, also reduces carbon emissions as it prevents the need for new buildings to be put up which often have a very high embodied carbon footprint.
Ken and Linda say there was no option to replace the barn with a modern building. They were glad to follow expert advice and to reinstate the barn as it once was. Adding that it was work that needed doing and couldn’t be avoided given the state of the building.
