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We were told by the estate agent that under the 1970s wallboard there may be an original old chalkstone fireplace. This, we thought, would probably date back to the late 1700s. Beams and old fireplaces, we were hooked! The photo above shows one board released so that we could peek inside. Yes, there it was, we could see a few chalkstone blocks, so we decided to take the plunge and remove the lot.

Oh dear, what had we done! Never mind, we did find some old artefacts from the 1950's, including a pile of old recipies, one of which was later used in a cook book produced by a local author.

Ah well, in for a centime in for a euro, so to speak. So we pressed on, or 'prised off' might be more apt! Let's have a go at the ceiling we thought.

Hmm, the false ceiling came down OK, but look what we found underneath it. The old original ceiling had been covered in plywood and wallpapered, several layers, Typical probably of the 1950s, that would have to go!

Old wall timbers, now wouldn't they make a great feature? This oak framing would not originaly have been exposed as, in those far off days, this was an exterior wall. But since an extension was built on the back of the house over a hundred years ago this isn't now the case. That radiator will have to go too.

After an awful lot of elbow grease, and a fair bit of swearing, the beams were cleaned up and the new ceiling boards were in place. This room remained in this state until 2005 when we put a temporary chimney lining in and fitted a wood stove.

Sadly, at this stage, opening up the original chalkstone fireplace wasn't an option as we had so much more important work to do in the house and garden.

We fitted an old reclaimed mantlepiece, a lick of white emulsion and moved some furniture in. This is the room as it was in 2006. But the fact that the original old fireplace was still there nagged us for two more years.

So, in December 2008, we ripped the plasterboard off and got out the lump hammer and cold chisel!

Cupboards removed and the brickwork knocked about a bit by a builder friend, and there we are, one very old fireplace almost completely revealed.

And down it came, this is what we have waited almost five years for. Now all we have to do is renovate it as best we can considering it has been covered up for 150 years or more. The test patch above the beam shows that it will probably look OK.

Our builder friend dressed the chalkstone above the fireplace and pointed it up. We think it looks pretty good. Unfortunately there's a bit of discolouration on a few stones due to water damage some time in the past as the next photo shows. Alex removed about 30 barrows of rubble which we know we can use on our next project, more of that in due course.

New timber framing in place and one side bricked up over the doorway. Hopefully the discoloured stone will be a little less conspicuous when it has dried out. In the meantime we will see if there's anything we can do to bring it back to white.

In the above photo all the ancient creosote and soot has been removed but unfortunately several chalkstone blocks were fire damaged beyond repair. The new surround has been fabricated and offered up for fit.

Here the surround has been fixed in place, this will eventualy be stained dark oak to match the rest of the room. We decided to relieve the stark white chalkstone with arched niches, should look nice with an ornament or a posy in them.

Above, the damaged chalkstone has all been replaced now and the brick hearth almost finished. We decided to have tiles behind the wood stove, the square of cement is recessed slightly ready for them.

Tomorrow (December 16th) the fireplace will be finished and a new flexible chimney liner put in. The last job the next day will be to fix a register plate in the chimney opening and fit the stove in place. After that it's just staining and varnishing the wooden fire surround, and making new doors for the cupboards either side.

20th December '08 - The register plate is now fitted and the flexible liner all connected up. Two photos above and below show the almost finished fireplace with just staining the wood, and the doors to make and fit each side, in the new year probably. At least we can now clean the room up and use it at Christmas. Our little 9.5kw stove looks a bit lost in this huge inglenook. Perhaps a bigger stove sometime in the future will be in order.

March '09. With Christmas over with, and January, February too, in March '09 we popped over to Wickes in Folkestone and bought a couple of Victorian style doors for £32 and some woodstain, we also bought 28 8x4 sheets of 11mm OSB board for our barn conversion, but that's another story. Anyway we did some adjustment to the frames and fitted the doors and the door furniture. We were going to make the doors ourselves, but the Wickes doors were a very good price, and we think they look just as good as the home-made lift latch doors that we had originally planned.

Then we started the process of gradually staining the pine down to the colour we wanted, sort of a dark rich colour. This meant two coats of a reddish stain to start with.

Then we finished off with one coat of dark oak Ronseal, fixed the handles and catches and cleaned up the room.

Pretty soon we will put in a new door frame through to the breakfast room and fit another Victorian style door there too. Last year we bought an old oak ceiling light, a huge one on chains which will suit this room perfectly when we've had it rewired. Then this room will be almost complete.

January 2010 - Just before Christmas we finished this room (below). After taking the walls back to the old lime plaster we installed insulated dry-lining, clad two walls with pine and installed a woodburner.