More smoothness at New House

If only everything in life was as silky-smooth as New House's new drive.

Arriving at work, we've long-grown used to having our bikes & car suspension well-shaken by Herefordshire's ancient lanes and pot-holes, so travelling the last few 100 metres on How Caple Court's new uber-smooth, ultra-quiet black velvet drive takes a bit of getting used to.

It's true that our drive needed work and wasn't improved by the pipe-laying for the Eco central boiler last year. Our eco boiler burns surplus wood from surrounding woodlands, so NHT is self-sustaining in heat.

Our drive was resurfaced by cheerful men last week, who arrived early and worked non-stop to finish the job :

The heat and smell of newly-laid tarmac is amazing, and it's now a joy to cycle the last 100 metre's to our office each day!

 

Top Drawer - London Olympia

I know this Top Drawer blog is well overdue, but it's because this was the best Top Drawer we've ever done and have been snowed under since.

Our clever designers Melanie and Charlotte, taped our new tea towels to the walls with bright coloured tape. It looked fantastic, and also very New House especially when Charlotte took up her felt pen and drew on the walls :

New products included Charlotte's new Wooof and Melanie's Asha tea towels :

Charlotte also extended her 'Family Favourites' design into trays :

Please let me know what you think

New more environmental FR fabrics

I've read that the number of accidents involving fire in the UK has dropped to an all time low. This is good news, and higher safety standards, better care or design must all have a part to play.

Roller blinds have never offered a great fire risk, mainly because at a blind at a window is probably well away from most likely sources of combustion (like unattended electric fires), and a blind has little weight or volume of combustible fabric within it. However as standards have improved, the demand for FR treated blind fabric has grown.

This is all good except behind the scenes, many of the common compounds that go into making a fabric FR (usually halides or bromides) are not great for the environment.

The EU has been looking at these compounds, have banned some, classified others as hazardous to health, bio accumulative or toxic, and others are under EU surveillance. 

This concerns us at New House, so are happy to launch a new suite of FR fabrics. We must confess that some do contain halides, but the most interesting fabrics to us are ones that use a new Swedish break-through FR coating that's completely halide-free. Our idea is to gain experience of this new coating, and then extend it to our other fabrics. We think the environment will be better for this!

Grand colonial FR fabric in black (also comes in white and natural) :

Some of the new fabric on our shelves ;

Preparing our sample brochure :

 

How Caple and lots of old cars

New house works from How Caple Court, and it can be a sleepy old place at times. Yet because of it's beautiful setting and 900yr old church, people frequently get married here at weekends, and there's also a vintage car auction every 3 months. The last auction was on Wednesday (the next marriage this Friday I think) :

 

 

This is an American Huber built in 1911 with a 'lifetime guarantee'. Unfortunately the company closed in 1913, so I hope it's new owner isn't too disappointed when he makes his first claim.



 

 

 

 

 

I'm told the Penny Farthing was a Gentleman's bike made by The Coventry Machinist Co in 1875.

I don't know what it is about old vintage cars and beards, but all the true enthusiasts seem to have one. Maybe because many of the old cars have no heaters, so you'd freeze to death if out on the road in winter without a good warm layer of hair on your chin?

The people who buy these lovely old cars get bitten by the collectors bug, and often end up owning a number. They can't resist turning up at the How Caple auction in style, so the car park is packed with interesting old cars too.

This is an old Peugeot. On the back seat the owner thoughtfully left a copy of a French classic car mag where it featured on the front cover.

 

I think this old Jag is an XK140. My grandfather (who started New House) used to drive an XK150, and a few E-Types too. He had a love-hate relationship with them as they were always going wrong. Being an engineer he was always tinkering with them, and used to take them back to the factory for modifications where he'd enjoy chatting to the engineers and designers who built the cars.

 

 

Eating and blind-making

There's nothing like visiting a few old New House customers in beautiful parts of England to work up an appetite.

On Wednesday I was at Beaver Blinds in Torpoint and ABC Blinds in Dorset. Both have used our fabrics for years and they are careful and impressive blind makers. Ones I'd whole-heartedly recommend.

Sitting in Beaver Blinds' office next to the water, it's not unusual to see some warship sail past. While just up the river, there's the famous Brunel Tamar bridge (sadly this is not my photo)...

ABC is in the lovely town of Bridport, and on the way home I happily stopped at River Cottage's famous Canteen & Deli in Axminster. 

 

I know it's a cliché, but I couldn't stop myself taking a pic of one of the most beautiful plates of salad & humus I've ever seen...

Decorated with colourful petals and nasturtiums it was a joy to look at and wonderful to smell. I felt BAD like a destroyer-of-art, gobbling this plate down so quickly.

Today at New House's design meeting, we discussed our September Top Drawer stand and chatted freely about our many other up-and-coming projects. We also had a superb lunch of fresh flower salad, cookies and all the other good things I'd picked up from the River Cottage Deli that helped our discussion flow and sparkle... there's nothing like a plate of good food to get everyone talking!

 

 

SS Great Britain - a masterpeice of engineering

One of my godsons, James visited last week and on a rainy day we went to the historic city of Bristol to see the SS Great Britain.

New House is a design and engineering company, and the ship & museum turned out a million times more interesting than I imagined.

The Great Britain was the world's first iron ship and another of Isambard Kingdom Brunel's genius designs. He's up there with Leonardo, Newton, Edison or Darwin as one of the worlds most original thinkers. Brunel calculated that even though iron was heavier than wood, it was much stronger, so a ship could be built that weighed less, could be bigger, carry more cargo or passengers and be more durable than any wooden ship.

It's a testimony to the British manufacturers of his day that they welcomed his new ideas, backed him, and built this amazing ship. In one huge technological leap SS Great Britain superseded all other ships.

To construct the vessel, Brunel built a new dry dock in Bristol. He originally designed his ship as a paddle-steamer, but saw a famous tug-of-war between a new propeller screwed vessel SS.Archimedes and HMS Rattler (of equal horse power, but a paddle-steamer). Seeing the screwed vessel pulling the other along at 2.5 knots, Brunel re-designed the Great Brittan so his single screw design let him place the engine at the lowest part of the hull and increase the deck space, that the paddle mechanisms would have taken up. 

After her launch in 1843 everywhere the Great Britain went she was a wonder, as she was by far the largest vessel afloat.

Eventually the Great Brittan was beached in the Falklands and used as a warehouse. Made from wrought iron (a heavy but slow-rusting iron) she survived. A huge donation by Sir Paul Getty allowed for the ship to be towed across the Atlantic to the Bristol dry dock where she was first constructed, 127 years later.

She's wonderful to see today and I recommend anyone to visit :

The engine room :

First class accommodation :

The old Mr. Brunel :

The NEW Mr. Brunel (my godson James) :