Another abandoned house with a mysterious history. This was my first explore with my new camera (Canon 7D and 10-22mm lens combo), and whilst the explore itself was a really interesting one I was really unhappy with my shots, so these are the best of a bad bunch I’m afraid. I suppose it’s all a learning curve, and at least I got to put the wide angle to immediate use.

This house was a real treasure trove, with sewing machines galore in the attic and abandoned classic cars in the overgrown grounds. To our amazement we discovered when I flicked a light switch about half an hour into our explore that the electricity was still on! The place clearly hasn’t been inhabited for decades (preserves in the pantry dating from the early 1970s, holes in the roof, etc), so it’s surprising that someone is still paying the electricity bill.

Credit to the excellent Darbians Photography for finding the house first… although we got the location details following unrelated sleuthing by Kubix_UK.

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We made use of some tea lights which had been left behind by previous explorers to add a little light to this piano. The room itself was pretty much pitch black, so the lighting in this shot is a mix of candlelight and light painting by torch.

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In to the living room, and more artefacts (which I think were arranged during a previous visit by kiss my pixels).
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The back room (dining room?), with the first of many sewing machines…
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The pantry…
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…including home-made preserves (walnuts? peaches? hard to tell) dating from 1971 and 1974! This shot was the most difficult of the lot, as the jars were on a shelf about 10 feet up in a dark alcove. I ended up resting my camera on a shelf on the opposite side of the room, experimenting with various shots taken blind (as the camera was against the wall), and then some very heavy cropping and processing to bring out what I’ve managed to salvage here.

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I then ventured upstairs to the bedrooms…
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Daily Fails from Charles and Di’s wedding in 1981…
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This is the second recent explore (see Forge Cottage) to feature the massively popular “Woman And Home” magazine. I can’t for the life of me work out why I don’t see it on the newsagent’s shelf these days…
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Up in to the attic… sewing machines, paintings, and gas lamps galore…
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And just time for one more car shot on the way out…
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Revisit – March 2014

I also paid a brief revisit in March 2014 with Urban X, and was really sad to see how much the place had gone downhill over just a few months. All of the sewing machines had gone, along with other items such as the stag antlers in the living room. I’m hoping that the owners of the house had simply removed them, but sadly I suspect they have been nicked. 🙁

I used the revisit to take a few more detail shots, and also of the Wolseley Six Eighty.

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Cheers, Adam X