Hambledon Village Trust has owned the freehold of the shop and attached cottage since 2003. During annual maintenance inspections it became very clear that a new roof was needed. The Trust’s only income is from the rent of the shop and cottage which meant that money needed to be secured before any work could start. Fundraising began at the village fete in June 2024, with an initial target of £100k.
By the end of last year we were nearly half way to the fundraising target, thanks to a sizable donation from the Hambledon Festival profits and many donations from individuals. Then in January this year we were delighted to be awarded a £20k Surrey County Council Your Fund Surrey grant, facilitated by our Ward County Councillor Kevin Deanus. With this, by the middle of March, we had reached nearly £90k, enough in the pot to start work.
During the autumn last year, villager Richard Bayley, our volunteer project manager with 30+ years of construction experience, started guiding us through the requirements for a successful project. As with all roof works, an initial bat survey must be carried out by a specialist ecologist (this survey was paid for by a grant from the Hambledon Community Fund). It showed the presence of a very few brown long-eared bats. Encouraged by Richard, because of the poor state of the roof, the ecologist applied for a European Protected Species Mitigation Licence which was awarded on Friday 21 March. This specifies that work must be completed within a limited timeframe with minimal bat movements; it also removes the need for a further two bat surveys.
Luckily things then fell into place. Our roofing contractor, selected after a rigourous tendering process, was available to start the work. His chosen scaffolders were finishing a job locally and were able to bring their scaffolding straight from there to the shop. The ecologist was available to attend site at the start of works. And the sun was shining!!
Work began on 7 April. We think the building dates to the 1800s and it soon became evident that a lot of repairs, including botching on top of botching, had taken place over the years. There were parts of the roof where the battens supporting the tiles were no longer attached to anything as the beams had rotted, as the photo shows. It certainly was time to do this work.
The main roof is now finished and the feedback on how it looks has been universally positive. But there is still more to do. Planning has started on the remaining work which will involve replacing the roof on the shop deli and the attached garage. We hope this will be complete by early autumn. The flat roof at the front of the shop does not need doing at this time and the funds raised for this will be put to one side in readiness.
A lot of people have been involved in getting us to this point, from those who donated money to enable the project to start; the Hambledon Community Fund panel which was involved in managing the money; those who did the work; those who had to put up with the work going on around them and Richard who pulled it all together. A big thank you to everyone.
From the village archives….
