Grandest of Them All

Anyone who regularly watches Grand Designs will recall Hellifield Peel Castle. It was the crumbling medieval tower rescued from ruin by Francis and Karen Shaw, and painstakingly brought back to glorious life, in the process fulfilling Francis’s long-cherished dream of living in a castle. The story was told in a specially extended episode of the show in 2007, when 6m people saw the couple overcome countless setbacks and disasters, from falling walls to meddling bureaucrats, before finally winning over a sceptical (isn’t he always?) Kevin McCloud with their patience, persistence and heroic attention to historic detail.

Of course, telly being telly, the version presented to the viewers wasn’t quite how it unfolded in reality. This wasn’t the usual pair of enthusiastic amateurs blundering optimistically towards catastrophe. Francis, 53, was an experienced architect with several large period projects to his credit, and those tricky, frustrating negotiations before English Heritage would allow them to start work on a scheduled ancient monument were actually fast, amicable and largely completed before he and Karen, 50, even bought the castle. “They want to make a programme about people spending too much and taking too long,” Francis says. “They want the viewers to think, ‘They’ll never succeed.’”

In fact, the work — which took two years — was completed exactly when Francis expected, if not according to the 12-month schedule requested by the show, and ended up costing exactly what he had predicted. Not that the money worries weren’t real. “I had worked out the cost to the nearest £1,000 before we started, and we couldn’t afford it. But we went ahead anyway.” The total bill came to £870,000, including £165,000 to buy the building. If the screen version didn’t quite match the reality, it captured perfectly the passion and steely determination that the softly spoken Francis brought to the process of restoring the landmark as honestly and accurately as possible. “I could have done it in a year if we’d built a steel frame, put a roof on straightaway and worked up from the middle,” he says. “But then I wouldn’t have been able to live in it — and it certainly wouldn’t have been on Grand Designs, because I wouldn’t have wanted anyone to see what I’d done.” The house now stands proudly on a patch of unspoilt farmland in Hellifield, a village on the edge of the Yorkshire Dales, about 10 miles from Skipton. Inside, it combines grand historic style with thoroughly modern comforts and technology. For all its 7,300 sq ft, it never feels overwhelming.

It certainly impressed McCloud, who spent a night in one of the four-poster beds for a follow-up programme and declared it one of his favourite renovations. And now a new owner will be able to enjoy its sweeping views and the thrill of feeling part of history. After 10 years of living amid the hand-carved stone fireplaces and oak panels, and with their two daughters now grown up, the Shaws are ready for a fresh challenge. They have decided to put the house, which has six double bedrooms, a self-contained penthouse flat and two acres of grounds, on the market for £1.65m. Francis had had his eye on this old “peel tower” — one of many built to guard the border with Scotland — since stopping off on the way to a family holiday at the age of nine. Since buying it, he has learnt that it was probably the last Knights Templar castle built in this country, and is definitely the last one still standing.

In a strategic spot on the old main road between London and Scotland, it was put up by Sir John Harecourt, one of the last Templars, to curry favour with Edward I and his son (later Edward II), who wanted somewhere to stay en route to battling the Scots. “It was a sort of toadying Travelodge,” Francis says. It earned Harcourt (who also arrested William “Braveheart” Wallace) his desired knighthood. Although the main part of the property dates from the early 14th century, the oldest surviving element is a “wolf tower”, built in 1205 to protect the residents and travellers from wolves that had been devouring passers-by. Yet it didn’t quite go as planned. “The spiral staircase was built so it suited a left-handed swordsman — probably not the best career move for an architect at a time when being left-handed was regarded as being in league with the devil,” Francis says. The tower is now a walk-through ensuite shower room, but you can see the outline of the stairs in the wall. The programme secured plenty of bookings for the luxury B&B business that has financed the couple’s time here, and if they invite the film crew back for their next project, they will at least know what they’re letting themselves in for. That next scheme is even more ambitious, and involves delving even further back in time. “It’s been a lifelong ambition to create a proper Roman villa,” Francis says. “Every Georgian house is a Roman villa, built by people coming back from the grand tour, but none of them is correct. This is about doing it right.” They’re looking for a site near Bath where they can build it — and an accompanying vineyard. Then they’ll just need to find a toga for Kevin McCloud... Hellifield Peel Castle is for sale for £1.65m (01423 523423, carterjonas.co.uk); shawandjagger.comThis article originally appeared on The Sunday Times.