Cranleigh Old Cottage Hospital Update – Someone ought to do something about it – we have!!
by Trevor Dale
At last, Cranleigh Heritage Trust can announce, with great pride, that we have been granted over £780,000 to restore and regenerate the old hospital cottage in Cranleigh. This money has come from Lottery players of course – via the National Lottery Heritage Fund – so please keep buying those tickets. I do so, on an irregular basis myself. About £100,000 of essential matched funding has come from other donors and grants. Some wish to remain anonymous, but we can mention the Pilgrim Trust (£20,000), Cranleigh Lions Club (£7500), Surrey Historic Buildings Trust (£5000), Surrey County Council (£5000)
It has been a long and tortuous journey that began with that classic statement: ‘someone ought to do something about that poor roof on the lovely old cottage’. That was a local resident, Miki Marks, to my wife, Sue Dale in 2018. Sue took it up with the local Council who told her something was in hand.
18 months of inaction and Sue decided to grasp the nettle and make a formal complaint, in the name of Cranleigh Civic Society, to NHS Property Services Ltd, who have the maintenance responsibility. That got a reply within 24 hours. The complaint handler rather liked the history behind the cottage and vowed to do all they could to help.
The result was the roof was fixed, or at least leaks were stopped. But it was abundantly clear that the wonderful cottage was still suffering badly from neglect. You are probably aware that the cottage was built in the 15th century and is Grade 11 listed. This is not terribly onerous but does mean the owners must stop it falling down or indeed deteriorating too badly. We met the chap who officially listed the cottage. Eagerly I asked what he thought. Oh I didn’t go in, he said, it looked good enough from the road!
Collectively the Civic Society team did not want to take on the clearly complex and onerous task of looking to restore the whole building, so Cranleigh Heritage Trust was registered with the Charity Commission as a CIO with some of the existing team and some new members.
So another 4 years of quite detailed work on confirming the feasibility of the project, applying for grants and getting expert advice, to get to the start of the restoration. Clearly the Heritage Fund have had their collective fingers burned in the past and they quite reasonably, scrutinise everything we do and insist that we have top level professional advice along the way. Indeed, their funding covers those expenses to ensure risks are managed as best they can.
If any of you are bat fanciers, we’ve had that checked out. Negative, no sign. The expert we engaged is an air traffic controller at Gatwick as his day job.
The first phase will involve appointing a project manager to oversee the administrative aspects and a building works project manager to handle the practical restoration.
Then using the surveys that have already been completed the team will seek tenders for the actual repair and conservation work. One of the very first physical activities will be to separate the cottage from the working hospital, which involves building an internal partition wall and obtaining independent utility services, primarily metered electricity and water.
Don’t expect to see any outwardly visible signs of restoration much before mid 2025 with completion about a year later.
Now the serious work begins. We are absolutely clear that we are handling public money from major funders and some smaller personal donations and of course those that are contributing through the Cranleigh 1000 Club, which is now producing funds.
For the end use in mid 2026, this will provide a much-needed venue for activities, hobby groups and therapies, as well as heritage education, archive research and a local information hub.
We believe that overall the cottage, by focussing on health and wellbeing, helps alleviate the stresses on our NHS. In turn this helps people keep away from acute hospitals by finding alternative health and wellness solutions.
FURTHER SUPPORT FOR THE PROJECT
There are many opportunities for enthusiastic volunteers to join the project. This promises to be a rewarding challenge for those with an interest in history and heritage, or in helping people. Please contact us by phone, 01483 272987, letter or email to;
If you are a charity, business or therapist please contact us to register your interest. We need long-term partners, and the Heritage Fund panel needs us to show them how we are engaging with our community.
To register an expression of interest in future use of the facilities please write to us with the following information:
1. Brief description of what you offer and the benefits to clients and customers.
2. Say if and where you currently offer this service and why people would use the cottage to meet you.
3. Brief declaration of support for the project in general.
4. Return name and address and any website or social media links.
Thank you so much! Trustees Trevor Dale – Chair; Howard Barratt; Jane Briggs; Chris Bulley; Sue Dale; Nigel West. Advisors Bob Callard – architect; Joanna James – business advisor, Michael Miller and Joy Horn, history advisors.
Visit our website:
www.cranleighheritagetrust.org.uk
