|
Belmont
House, Island of Unst, Shetland
2009
Belmont
project moves towards completion
After a year of “invisible” work – fund-raising
! – the Belmont Trust was happy to announce,
at the end of 2008, the beginning of the house’s
internal restoration. This is an enormous task, as
those of
you who have
visited will be aware. We have to choose everything
from baths to lightsockets, from door furniture to
kitchen taps. But it’s very exciting for
the Trustees, the cherry on the cake, to be thinking
about the details that will make the house come
alive
again
and be liveable in.
Our contractor, Shetland Amenity Trust north isles
squad, is gearing up to start work. They are like
old friends to us now and their commitment and workmanship
is part of the reward of the whole project.
We
are now planning the interiors—and what a
challenge that is! Warm white timber panelling
and Chinese
blue walls in the drawing room, a rich ochre in
the dining room and sunny yellow and Venetian red
for
the small writing room lit by the immense Venetian
window. The two pavilions are fully fitted out
with timber lining to the attics and pitch pine
beams
and flooring. These give much better spaces than
we had imagined possible and the west pavilion
will be a hideaway for a writer or an adventure
for children
sleeping under the eaves.
June
2008
2004
Belmont
is a small but perfect Georgian house built in 1775
and set in a designed
landscape overlooking a vista on
three
sides
- sea,
sky and islands.
It
is classically symmetric with quadrant walls, twin
pavilions and formal gardens, and it retains the original
interior
mouldings and paint colours.
A
house of this sophistication, set in
an incomparably
beautiful natural setting, would be memorable anywhere;
it is now being reinstated by the Belmont
Trust as one of Shetland's most important buildings.
Phase
1 of the restoration was completed in May
2006 and the first part of phase 2 in September 2007.
An early drawing of Belmont clearly showing
the planned walled policies and the farmstead
behind. Undated c.1830
|
