Saturday
Gone.
Friday
I couldn’t come down and take photos today, so the only thing recording was the time-lapse. It’s great that the whole thing carries on regardless!
Thanks very much, Alan and the team!
Thursday
We were due to go off to look at universities today, but we couldn’t leave before checking in with the guys. Alan and his team have done a really fine job with the demolition and he believes they’ll be offsite by Friday. All the material has been sorted, and today is mostly carting away. When I popped by this afternoon, they were taking out the drains. Lovely!
Wednesday
It’s hard to tell what’s happened during the day when we have a look in the evening. But I suspect that since the digger is riding rather lower that there have been a series of skips down the lane to take our house away.
The garden that I’ve dug, re-dug and tended for 16 years is completely trashed. I couldn’t even recognise where the well was today! (it’s under a fence by the shrub in the first photo below)
Photos are becoming a little less interesting as there is less and less to show.
We expected there to be some digging out of foundations occurring this week, but Alan says there were absolutely none. The whole house was resting on earth. Bonkers. What an enormous relief that we didn’t engage on a restoration programme. We would have had to underpin the whole thing. One of the reasons we didn’t go down the renovation route was because we really didn’t want to find out the house’s inner secrets and be surprised. Surprises make good TV for Grand Designs, and not for our nice calm and organised job in Oxshott. I just hope they don’t find the bones of Alice Grey somewhere…. (more on her later).
Tuesday
They’ve left a little bit of the wall round the back of the kitchen that contains the water pipe. It saves the demolition guys putting in a stand pipe while they’re onsite. That will be a job for the main contractor.
I can’t believe how many bricks they’re keeping. Lots of them have spalled (are spalling?), and I thought they weren’t of any use to anyone. But they look much neater and tidier on the pallets than they ever did on the house!
All that’s left is clearing and grubbing out the foundations. Dulux says that they’ll start setting out next week.
Monday
Amazing. I love the speeded action video — a thousand little nibbles make giant gobs of house disappear in a hurry. So they are salvaging materials, eh? Glad to know that. Farewell, old house.
Yes, goodbye! Recycling is a big theme–they left the garage standing as a storage space, but when it goes the rubble will be used as hardcore to build up the patio. They’re saving the good bricks, but it’s incredible how quickly the duff ones disintegrate to powder.
That’s nutty that your house wasn’t on a foundation. In a way I guess it makes sense but sheesh. Yes, it’s a good thing you guys didn’t go the restoration route! I find myself switching back and forth between a detached sense of simply seeing a demolition job and then really stepping into the house with you guys all in it and growing up. Surreal to see it all gone…but now I’m looking forward to seeing the new house go up!