Historic building restoration

Dan Barton set up his business, Dan Barton Historic Building Restoration, 14 years ago after recognising the need for his expertise in the county, for example among the half-timbered houses of south Oxfordshire.

Among his many skills are timber repairs, fine joinery, timber-framing, roofing and brickwork, and lime plastering for projects such as the exterior of Priory Cottage in Steventon, for the National Trust.

His work has also taken him further afield to be involved in a range of prestigious projects, including one at the Althorp Estate, the family home of Princess Diana.

He spent three months working on the conversion of the former stables into a museum, and on the temple beside the lake.

Other restoration work has taken place at Windsor Castle and the bell tower of the St John’s Beaumont School in Windsor, and farther afield on the sails of the restored windmill at Thaxted in Essex for English Heritage.

Mr Barton and his wife Janette, both 39, are partners in the company and work from a base near Kingston Bagpuize.

Working on historic buildings represented a change in career for him, having swapped from another traditional craft, cabinet-making and fine furniture restoration; a subject in which he qualified at Brunel Technical College, Bristol.

He said: “When I left college I became self-employed. That was an incredibly hard way of working. One thing I missed out on was having somebody to guide me and help me learn from my mistakes.”

Mr Barton suffered a series of discouraging knocks during the course of his early career.

He explained: “You have put your heart and soul into a design and planning the techniques — then, at the point when you give the quote to the potential client, you lose the job.”

Another unfortunate incident occurred while working on a chest of drawers.

He was paying them special attention by lining them with limewood, rather than the more usual birch, during the course of which he injured his thumb in a machine.

After two weeks of not being able to work, he asked for an interim payment but was refused.

But as the door to one way of working was closing, another was about to open.

He explained: “We were living next door to a large house and IJP Conservation came to do some work there,” he recalled.

“I gave the people there my card and the very same evening I received a call asking if I would like to join them in a project to make a set of gates for a lock on the River Thames.

“So I went from making things which I could move about, to colossal structures which were static.

“In the short time I was working with these people, I learnt an awful lot.”

This has has led to a continuing successful association with Henley-based IJP.

Naturally, this type of work requires a keen eye for detail to ensure important but minute features are not overlooked, or covered up.

Examples of this are the scratch marks or dials that may appear above a fireplace, or by a door or window. These were a superstitious form of protection in times past, drawn at entrance points as a means of warding off evil spirits.

Houses are not the only structures where history needs to be preserved.

At Cogges Manor Farm Museum, Witney, the company worked on replacement woodwork for the feeding troughs and stalls of the byre, following a fire several years ago.

The building is sufficiently important to be a Scheduled Ancient Monument so, once more, attention to detail was paramount.

But Mr Barton’s skills are not just limited to the historic — his work can involve the conversion of ancient barns into houses, and cartsheds into garages using appropriate contemporary styles and methods.

Linking the past with the present day is vital, and it is also important for the preservation of Mr Barton’s craft to have an eye on the future, too.

Mrs Barton, who shares her husband’s enthusiasm for the work, added: “These skills need to be preserved. We want young people to come in and learn them.”