DH Painter & Decorator takes on commercial and community painting in Yardley Gobion, 9.7 miles south of Northampton town centre. The village has no business park or shopping parade, so the work here is mostly the pub, the village hall, the churches, the primary school and The Meadows Care Home.
A short list of non-domestic buildings
The 2013 conservation area appraisal describes Yardley Gobion as mainly residential. It lists one pub, the Coffee Pot on the High Street, a post office, two churches, a village hall, a primary school and The Meadows Care Home at High Croft House. We found no shopping parade or business park in the sources we checked. Commercial painting here is therefore a handful of buildings with very different uses, and they have little in common apart from being shared by the village.
| Building | Where | Planning point |
|---|---|---|
| The Coffee Pot pub | High Street, conservation area | Trading hours; traditional exterior colours |
| Village hall | Chestnut Road | Bookings calendar; narrow, walled road |
| St Leonard’s Church and the United Reformed Church | High Street and Chestnut Road | Services; railings and stone walls |
| Yardley Gobion Primary School | Modern development to the south | School holidays |
| The Meadows Care Home | High Croft House | Residents in occupation; low-odour products |
The Coffee Pot and the High Street frontage
The Coffee Pot is the one survivor of the three pubs that served the turnpike road through the village in the 18th century. The Black Star and the Two Wrestlers have gone. It stands in the conservation area, and the appraisal names shop fronts and signage among the changes that can erode the area’s character. A repaint of the frontage, window joinery or signboard should keep to traditional colours, and anything that changes the look of the building should be checked with West Northamptonshire Council first.
Inside a pub the issue is time. Bars and dining rooms can be painted before opening, on a quieter day, or one area at a time with low-odour water-based paints so that rooms are usable again the same day.
Halls, churches and the school
The village hall and the United Reformed Church, built in 1826 as a Baptist chapel, are both on Chestnut Road. It is narrow and enclosed by boundary walls and fencing, so van parking and the delivery of long ladders need agreeing in advance with the hall committee or church. Interior work in a hall is planned around its bookings, and decorating in sections lets the groups that meet there keep using it.
St Leonard’s Church, designed by E.F. Law in 1853, stands above the High Street behind a stone wall topped with metal railings. Railings like these need rust treatment and a suitable metal primer before top coats. Any work on the church building itself will need the approval of the church authorities first.
The primary school is in the post-war development south of the village. Most school decorating is done in the holidays, when classrooms and corridors can be emptied and paint has time to cure before children return. Our main commercial painting page covers how we plan work in occupied premises.
Decorating where people live: the care home
The Meadows Care Home occupies High Croft House, an Edwardian building from around the turn of the 20th century. Decorating in a care home means residents are present throughout. Work is phased room by room in agreement with the manager. We use low-odour, quick-drying paints, keep corridors clear and exits unobstructed, and tidy up at the end of each session. Its Edwardian joinery also takes longer to prepare than the woodwork in a modern building.
For more about the village, see our Yardley Gobion area page.
Last updated by Dean, DH Painter & Decorator.
