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To the manor reborn
How a medieval barn became a modern sanctuary
Thekla and luc Benevello knew what they were letting themselves in for when they decided to buy la Queurie, a 15th-century manor in normandy, because they had restored old houses before. But this was their biggest and bravest acquisition to date: surrounded by farmland and ramshackle outbuildings, the manor house was in a sad state of disrepair.
‘I ag reed to go through it all again because it was going to be the last house we rescued,’ says Thekla. ‘It was the place we planned to settle for the rest of our lives.’
They could not afford to restore the medieval house fully, so the plan was to save it from further deterioration and to convert the largest of the barns into a home. For the first two years, the farm remained tenanted and was home to a dairy herd of 200 cows. In 2007, the farmer moved out and work began. Five years on, luc, a photographer specialising in portraits, compiled a book entitled La Queurie 2005-2010, documenting their progress.
he wrote poetic ally about the responsibility they felt of becoming
the caretaker sofa place with 600 years of history, and about the insignificance of their own contribution in the context of the building ’s lifespan. He also related how the roof of the largest barn collapsed just 15 days after they signed the purchase contract, and talked of how they often felt like giving up.
In 2011, Luc and Thekla were finally ready to begin making a new home for t hemselves a nd t hei r t wo ch i ld ren inside the soaring spaces of the barn, one end of which had been st ables, while the other end originally housed a massive granite cider press.
Their principle was one of respect for the past, but also of care for their impact on t he present. ‘ We t r ied to waste as little as possible and reused everything we could,’ Thekla says. ‘We
The roof of the largest barn collapsed just 15 days af ter they signed the contract, and they of ten felt like giving up
‘It is the most wonderful place to live. The light is beautiful, the air is so fresh and you can swim in the river’
used local Normandy oak for the floors and cut the planks to follow the line of t he t ree t r unks. It makes lay ing t he f loors much more difficult and timeconsuming, but Luc did it all himself.’
The double-height ceiling is panelled and insulated with hay bales, and the thick stone walls have an ext ra layer thanks to an intra-wall heating system from Germany. Hot water and heating are fuelled by a biomass boiler that uses offcuts from the local sawmill.
The interior of the barn is strikingly plain, the modernity given warmth and character by the textures of lime plaster and oak. Four floor-to-ceiling windows give views across the sunken path of the River Orne to the fields beyond.
If you enter through the middle door from the old farmyard, you find yourself in the central living room, its ceiling formed by a white box that encloses Thekla’s bedroom and bathroom. To the left, past a central utility room, is the double-height kitchen, its working core tucked underneath a study suspended above it like the bridge of a ship.
Thekla and Luc worked on the design together, and their care for every detail shows, whether in the way the oak kitchen cupboards stand just proud of the wall into which they are fitted, or in the choice and placing of hooks in the bathrooms. Some of the furniture is modern, some vintage, such as the 1970s sofas which belonged to Thekla’s parents. But there are also inherited antiques, which look particularly striking in this contemporary setting.
It is an impressive creation for two people with no training in architecture or interior design: Thekla left her native Germany in the 1990s to work as a magazine designer in Paris. After meeting Luc, having their two children, and moving out of the city, she studied horticulture and garden design, and these remain passions. La Queurie has benefit ted from her knowledge, its buildings now edged by lush planting, its land enhanced by more than 100 new trees, and 2km of new hedging.
Before the barn was finished, though, Luc became ill. He died in 2015. Even though both of the children have since left home to study, Thekla decided to stay on, finish the project, and live the life she and Luc thought they would share in this idyllic place.
She spends as much time as she can in the garden and offers bed and breakfast in her two spare bedrooms. ‘It is the most wonderful place to live. The light is beautiful, the air is so fresh and you can swim in the river,’ she says. ‘All the land is farmed organically. I only eat meat from my own chickens, which also give me eggs every day.
‘I am very, very lucky to be here. This is my paradise on ear th. Luc felt the same about it.’
laqueurie.wordpress.com Extracted from Perfect French Country by Ros Byam Shaw (Ryland , Peters & Small, £30). The book is available for £25 with free p&p from the Telegraph Bookshop (0844-871 1514; books.telegraph.co.uk)