About St Cuthbert's House

Don't worry that the list to the left has changed...we've added lots of tabs to the list, now that you've clicked on 'About St Cuthbert's House', giving access to information about the various areas of the house. Just work your way down the list!

An ancient building ...

St Cuthbert's House was built in 1810 as a Presbyterian Church. We have a fascinating book, written in 1910 by the (then) Minister, detailing the ‘first 100 years’. It’s a charming and important historical document, and it’s available for you to browse during your stay.

We bought the church, and the adjoining manse next door, which became our family home in 1998, when the church closed its doors. The small congregation which was meeting there up to that point still meets together in the Parish church, just a few strides down the road. They will give you a very warm welcome if you visit them, especially if you tell them where you’re staying!

The old manse has been a beautiful and happy place to bring up our growing (grown?!) family of four children.

The church building was in poor condition, quite dilapidated. We wanted to bring it to life so that it might continue to ‘tell the story’ which it had become part of over 200 years. It remains the most prominent building in the village, and we wanted it to continue to welcome visitors, whether they be casual passers-by, pilgrims, or searchers…

And so eventually we began the painstaking job of re-designing and renovating the church. There are too many episodes in the ‘planning permission’ saga, but perhaps we can tell you some of those over a glass of wine...

Work began in summer of 2007, and was completed in time to welcome our first visitors in May 2008. The bedrooms and the main meeting space have been named after some of the Celtic Christian men and women who first brought the gospel to Northumbria, and to Britain - Cuthbert, Bede, Oswald, Brigid, Hild, Aidan - and Columba, who never came here but who 'started it all' in some ways...

The house has been imaginatively and beautifully redesigned with the help of our friends David & Jane Darcy, who are architects. Actually, I should say that they helped Jill, because I can claim little (if any) of the kudos for the finished design. I just don’t see those things easily!

we had fantastic tradesmen on our job, and we can't praise them enough... We have retained much of the charm and character - like the pulpit, a ‘balcony’ viewing area, a communion table, and some of the original pillars. Loads of original timber, including the floorboards and some panelling, were carefully removed and have been re-integrated into the new construction, by expert tradesmen who also care about such things.

So, what does the ‘new’ house have? Click the links to the left to go on a tour…