Leck are moving quickly through the building and are now stripping out the interior of the cottage, the mountain of wood outside is growing by the minute, meanwhile on the other side of the building the scaffolding is being erected, ready for work to begin on the roof.

Posted by Lisa Stewart
Thursday, January 24, 2008 at 14:10 GMT

Topics: 'building' 'Lawson Park'

An interesting site meeting today to discuss and co-ordinate the process for the installation of the ground source heat system for Lawson Park. This system is designed to extract heat from the earth to provide the heating and hot water for the new building. As the geology of the site is principally bedrock, a series of seven vertical boreholes are going be drilled, up to 70m deep, these are then connected via a loop system filled with refrigerant to a heat exchange system which connects to the underfloor heating and hot water system.

This part of the contract is being carried out by Earth Energy and has been partly funded by The Low Carbon Buildings Programme

For more information on ground source heat pumps

Posted by Lisa Stewart
Monday, January 21, 2008 at 16:00 GMT

Topics: 'building' 'ground source heat' 'Lawson Park'

Well its the end of the first week of building work at Lawson Park and things are progressing well, although the weather has been so awful this must be the first day the contractors have glimpsed the 'Old Man of Coniston', a view which is omnipresent from our office, the Black Moss, surely a strong contender for best view from an office?

As part of the re-development of the Lawson Park site we are hoping to underground the overhead power cables which pass directly across this spectacular view. We are meeting the Friends of the Lake District next week and are hopeful they might be able to include Lawson Park in their
Overhead Wires Project

Posted by Lisa Stewart
Friday, January 18, 2008 at 13:11 GMT

Topics: 'building' 'friends of the lake district' 'Lawson Park'

Who would have thought one missing JCB would have such an impact to so many things, assisted by 48hrs of torrential rain, our site has been transformed into a swamp, but work continues as Leck progress swiftly through the barns ripping out the floors to reveal the full extent of the space we have to work with.

Posted by Lisa Stewart
Wednesday, January 16, 2008 at 12:39 GMT

Topics: 'building' 'Lawson Park'

With one fail swoop Lawson Park passes from Grizedale Arts to Leck Construction and work begins on what will become Grizedale Arts new home, well only the small matter of a giant swan, a colossal billboard and a barn full of abandoned refrigerator parts to sort out, all various remnants of artists projects.

Posted by Lisa Stewart
Monday, January 14, 2008 at 11:00 GMT

Topics: 'building' 'Lawson Park' 'Leck Construction'

We finally handed Lawson Park to the builders – Leck, a local firm who will be here for 9 months stripping and rebuilding the interiors of the house and barns. Day one coincided with torrential rain - combine rain and builders and you get knee deep mud , and the impression the building is just a pile of stones sliding down a muddy hill – which I guess it is - all its significance and meaning evaporated like it never was. It really brought a lot of memories back to me of people and dinners, events and extraordinary happenings, it was nice to be reminded and to think about how much had come from the house and the location.

Here’s a few moments that sprang to mind
6 wives of Henry the 8 reversing into the ravine
Colin Lowe and Roddy Thomson fighting and crying
Emily Wardill’s black dinner
Jesse Rae’s radio station
Olaf Breuning listening to a chainsaw artist singing a song about a cat
Damon Packard’s table manners
Juneaus burning a radio over a camp fire and the radio just kept going and going
Mark Wallinger repeatedly talking over a particularly boring dinner guest who kept mentioning Andy Goldsworthy
Karen in animated discussion flanked by Robert Woof and Ken Russell
The Japanese villagers of Toge changing into my giant checked clothes following a very wet mornings work
Gelitin partying in the meadow
Rose Lord, Adam Chodzko and Clio Barnard walking down the drive dressed as the 3 pigs
Kerry Stewart’s giant swan being mistaken for a real swan
Jon Ronson dancing hard, alone, to ELO in the barn after the Festival of Lying
Sarah Staton re-appearing in her car, hours after a dinner party ended, having been lost in the forest
Nina & Karen locked into the dining room for a week sewing elaborate Tudor costumes
Robert Woof (shortly before his death) walking slowly through the wild flower meadow to see the rare orchid

If you have any of your own please add them via the comments

Posted by Adam Sutherland
Monday, January 14, 2008 at 10:45 GMT

Here's young design guru Supermundane getting superinspired about thinking up new signage for Lawson Park, as part of the Yes design duo's work for GA. As it was our director Adam's birthday we all got treated to a bountiful pub dinner, and a very convivial night it was too.
One of the challenges is to think up some cool ways to signpost / name things like the raised vegetable beds, which for over a year we have struggled to do. Current favourite is to name the beds after past GA projects but how the hell anyone is meant to remember which one is 'It rocks, but gently' as opposed to 'Roadshow' or 'Let's Get Married' may mean a long stay on the drawing board for that concept.

Posted by Karen Guthrie
Wednesday, January 2, 2008 at 16:25 GMT

After several weeks of neglect following our temporary move away from Lawson Park, the Kitchen Garden looked a tad forlorn when I started my tidy-and-harvest session today. There were - surprisingly - quite a few passers-by despite the drizzle, but I do miss having the cats around when I'm there now - they however think nothing of their wild former home as they lounge among the central heating in our new place.
The Honesty Stall would have done good business had I anything green to spare for sale.
So - on the 31st December 2007 we harvested a basket of the following:
Turnip 'Golden Globe' (growing in the polytunnel)
Mixed salad (also in the tunnel)
Savoy cabbage
Lamb's lettuce
Black radish 'Hamburg' (insanely hot to taste)
Chrysanthemum greens
Scorzonera
Parsnip 'Tender and true'
Beetroot 'Chioggia'
Radicchio
Burdock
Celeriac
Brussel sprout 'Cavalier'

The worst weather here is yet to come, but I'm still justifiably chuffed with this for a Hogmanay haul...

Posted by Karen Guthrie
Monday, December 31, 2007 at 22:11 GMT

Topics: 'vegetables'

Here's a drawing of life at Lawson Park by my talented niece Emma Quinn, who seems to have pictured the pigs as angels looking down on the human and feline inhabitants.

Posted by Karen Guthrie
Thursday, December 20, 2007 at 13:25 GMT

A go at the massive Lawson Park compost bins today revealed a tremendous worm community within the layer of shredded art junk mail within.
Hmmm.

Posted by Karen Guthrie
Tuesday, December 11, 2007 at 17:15 GMT