Crying my eyes out, new neighbour has just put all the beautiful period fretwork from his Edwardian house in the skip -smashed up!

[LoveMAFS]

I didn't even get a chance to rescue any of it... and it's nicer than mine, beautifully detailed. Why do people buy period houses and then strip them bare of what makes them special?

Regarding original features, why do they have any more merit than new ones? Why does a feature from 1920 have more value than a feature from 1990? I don't like the idea of gardens being destroyed as that's living things - trees, grass, shrubs, bushes, homes for birds and wildlife. That makes a lot of sense to me. But regarding 'feature's in houses I just don't get it personally.

I would never buy a house to change loads of it purely because it doesn't make sense to me. I also wouldn't want one to stick out from all of the others in the road because it's not fair on the neighbours. So I suppose I get it from that point of view. I guess I just don't get why an antique fireplace for example is 'better' than one that was built two years ago. At some point those will be the antiques. I don't know, the year something was built just seems like an arbitrary thing to me. I suppose maybe I should look at it from the point of view that it's destroying something needlessly, which I don't like.

pop round and ask if you can rescue from the skip. mention that your own fretwork has been valued at a thousand pounds a metre.
Don't say that the person who valued it was you.

I guess I just don't get why an antique fireplace for example is 'better' than one that was built two years ago.

Because original features are the same age as the house and they suit it. I thought we were done with gutting lovely old houses after the ravages of the 1960s but no, there’s a new generation doing it now. It’s so sad.

Regarding original features, why do they have any more merit than new ones? Why does a feature from 1920 have more value than a feature from 1990?

I think there is a unity in design, it adds to the completeness, it has the look of the time all the finishings were assembled and it gives a pleasing overall sense. For example, the fittings will have been put in place with the proportions of the room they need to fit in mind.

Near where we used to live, there were rows of Victorian terraces with little paths from the front door to the gate. The paths were tiled, originally. Some people tore up the tiles and paved over them - probably just couldn't be bothered with the maintenance of the original tile. It just took away from the completed, unified look and removed something of the sense of time and place, which to me, contribute to the vision and legacy and leave something more ordinary in its place.

I guess I just don't get why an antique fireplace for example is 'better' than one that was built two years ago. At some point those will be the antiques. I don't know, the year something was built just seems like an arbitrary thing to me. I suppose maybe I should look at it from the point of view that it's destroying something needlessly, which I don't like.

I don't think it's even a case of what is 'better', as opinion and taste will differ from person to person. It's just that, if something is limited (no more being made), it seems quite odd and selfish to buy it when you don't want/like it and others do. As PP have said, a period house comes with period features and is just spoilt by being bastardised so that it's neither period nor modern anymore.

It might be a bit of a strange analogy, but I would kind of compare it with those protesters who went into supermarkets and tipped the milk all over the floor (although they hadn't even paid for it, unlike the house buyers, to be fair; but also, the milk supplies aren't finite). Some people in that supermarket wanted the milk and put it into their trolleys to buy - fine. Some shoppers didn't want the milk, so they left it on the shelves - also fine. It just seems so strange and selfish to buy/procure/take something that you don't really want when others do want it.

As another milk-related analogy, remember when milk was hard to get hold of during the pandemic/panic-buying times, and some people without children were taking all the formula milk off the shelves and buying it for themselves, to use in coffee. They would have quickly realised that baby formula is nasty tastes nothing like standard powdered milk that an adult would like, and meanwhile, the babies were being deprived of the only food they could eat. All in all, nobody won, really.

Get a grip, or maybe if you liked it so much you should have bought the house yourself?!

Beautifully put @StephanieSuperpowers. One of my friends has an Edwardian house with every feature intact including a tiled front path. It’s such a joy to walk in and see the original floors, fireplaces and doors, even the brass doorknobs are still there.

Surely everyone's idea of what is beautiful differs? If I own a home I would expect to be able to do whatever I want to it without some self-righteous person enforcing their idea of beauty onto me.

Incidentally, I belong to the local historic places organisation, but that doesn't stop me from believing people have the right to do whatever they want to their own house. I might not agree with what they do, but would still defend their right to do it. I would never in a million years live in a place where there were rules about what I did with my house/garden.

Surely everyone's idea of what is beautiful differs? If I own a home I would expect to be able to do whatever I want to it without some self-righteous person enforcing their idea of beauty onto me.

But isn't there a difference between differing tastes and what is, essentially, vandalism by ripping out original features?

There's loads of new builds or featureless 1980s houses in every town so why do people even buy old houses if they don't like them?

My house is listed. We can’t have doubled glazed windows for that reason. Or a UPVC front door. If I was desperate to have those things I’d have to move. It’s a great shame more old houses aren’t protected from what amounts to vandalism.

Surely everyone's idea of what is beautiful differs? If I own a home I would expect to be able to do whatever I want to it without some self-righteous person enforcing their idea of beauty onto me.

I wasn't going from an angle of 'this is beauty and you must agree', but my response was to suggestion that, because some people tragically lose their homes, there's no point in trying to keep/make anything nice - whatever you perceive 'nice' to be. Of course, that school of thought would equally apply to the people ripping out the period features in order to make the house into their idea of nice.

We see it a lot on MN: where people seem to think that, because there are terrible things happening in the world, that means that nobody can be interested in or concerned about anything less pressing. Just because some people are relying on food banks (and others in the world are actually starving), that makes it somehow disrespectful to ask on here if anybody has a good chocolate cake recipe.

I never said there is no point in wanting something to look nice, but you seem to have completely overlooked the fact that what YOU think is beautiful someone else might not. Saying it is "defeatist" to not want to have a house looking the way YOU think it should is in the same mould.

I also never said that because there are terrible things happening in the world nobody can be interested or concerned about anything less pressing - but for someone to be "crying their eyes out" over something so trivial makes me despair of how shallow some people can be. It is a completely OTT reaction to a person doing what they think is best with their own house.

I also firmly believe that it is not how a house looks which is important, rather than what happens inside that house (i.e the life which is lived inside it).

Of course, this is MN, where people are not supposed to be individuals but to follow the "accepted" way of doing things.

I’m guessing this thread didn’t go the way the op imagined. It was the daft crying my eyes out thing.😂

historicengland.org.uk/listing/what-is-designation/local/conservation-areas/

historicengland.org.uk/advice/heritage-at-risk/conservation-areas-at-risk/

@LoveMAFS , I agree its a shame to destroy original features on buildings. It is often due to certain types of builders lying to the owners, alleging that the feature 'is all decayed and can't be repaired'! In fact the great majority of features can be repaired, people need to insist, however some builders don't have the skills or interest or even time and will lie about it. There us a shortage of skills out there. The good news is that there are decent conservation builders and proper craftsmen out there.