A 17th-century Barn Lovingly, Restored By Its Design-smart Owners

A 17th-century barn in the French countryside is brilliantly, and lovingly, restored by its design-smart owners.

- David Nicholls

Right,’ we thought. ‘First things first: remove all the rubbish and 30 years’ worth of cow dung and let’s see what we have to work with.’ Oona Bannon is recalling what was going through her and her husband Russell Pinch’s minds in 2003 as they began the process of converting a 17th-century cow barn in rural western France. The site is barely an hour from the coast and Île de Ré – sometimes referred to as the French Hamptons – but its atmosphere is far more aligned with the local village of Surgères, which is, happily, further off the tourist and expat trail.

The story really starts almost 40 years earlier, when Russell’s parents and a few aunts and uncles, all with a sense of idealism and a can-do attitude, bought the little hamlet in which the barn sits. This sounds far more romantic than it must have been at the time. Historically, there were 27 buildings on the site – workers’ cottages, stables and more – but by the seventies, most of these had, as Oona puts it, ‘fallen into disrepair and seeped into the fields.’ Nonetheless, Russell’s father John was enraptured with it.