This is a retrospective post about all the work that has happened at Farley Hospital over the Winter. Some updates were shared in the Dunn Valley News before, but now that we have a website it’s here too in a bit more detail.
We have had to really prioritise what work to do as funds are very tight (did you notice our donations page??) All the work we’ve managed to complete so far was either very important to the residents of our cottages or has been in repairing the Wardenry for use again.
We have also had the 5 year architects report for the whole building commissioned and delivered. There is so much to do to give this very special building the treatment it deserves… Did I mention our donations page?
The cottages
The Farley Hospital has 6 x 1 person cottages, a two bedroom cottage and a three bedroom cottage. All 8 residences have needed some sort of work over the winter. Our main priority was to make sure that all the homes were warm, something that hasn’t always been the case in our 17th century building! Works that we have completed in the cottages includes:
- Most importantly, all old storage heaters were replaced and additional ones installed
- All chimneys have been swept and some have been re-lined
- Most cottage backdoors had problems. Some of these were fixed with more still to do!
- The brickwork to support a rear gate had come away from the wall and is now properly fixed again.
Cottage Number 8 became vacant in late 2020 so we refurbished it ready for a new resident. We:
- Fitted new heating
- Fitted a new kitchen
- And a new bathroom
- Installed new carpets
- And redecorated the whole cottage

Wardenry
We are in the middle of refurbishing the Wardenry. The interior of the building needed to be restored to a maintainable standard and it will be available to rent with AirBnB soon. Here are some of the things that have been going on:
- Floors have been insulated
- Some carpets have been replaced
- The AGA has been removed and will be replaced with a donated electric range
- Work on bathroom is almost complete
- Painting and decorating looks amazing!
- We have to fit a new handrail on the steps leading out the back of the Wardenry to the gardens. We are going to have an iron rail installed that matches the one installed at the entrance to the Church.
