It’s now 4 weeks since we got the keys to the building, with another 7 weeks before we open, so it seemed a good time to post a general update on how things are going. The panic hasn’t set in…just yet!
The main room is almost completed and the play equipment frame is being installed this week, so we can get other things built around it. They’ll then be back after Easter to perform their magic and transform it from a piece of scaffolding into a fantastic play area.
I was hoping to clean up and treat the original floorboards to give the interior a beautiful and original finish, but after much deliberation I just couldn’t guarantee it would be 100% suitable for active little feet over a long period, so we’ll instead be laying a new floor surface. The last few days have therefore been spent removing 1000s upon 1000s of these staples leftover from the previous flooring:
And my next few days will be spent laying down this preparation board with yes, you’ve guessed it, 1000s upon 1000s of staples! Sometimes life is so circular 🙂
But I also found a unique solution to a small problem we had. We’ll have a large central cafe bar and we’ll also have a large kitchen, but there was no link between the two. A new doorway was out of the question for technical reasons so the next best option was a serving hatch linking the two. So what do you do if you want to create a serving hatch between two rooms? Easy. You cut into the existing wall, find an operational (albeit damaged) sash window buried within it and repair/convert the sash into the perfect serving hatch! (the picture of the original window is taken from the kitchen side)
I think we can confidently say we’ll be the only play centre serving food through an original sash window 🙂
Now that all of the big jobs are almost completed in the main room, I’ll soon be moving into the other areas. In the next few weeks I’ll be:
- Sorting out the entrance lobby and also, maybe, knocking down the entrance porch so you all have a straight route into the front door (if we get approval in time). But something tells me that porch might be my achilles heel!
- Bringing all three toilets up to scratch (currently male, female and disabled). They’ll all become unisex, and each one will have a changing area, so you should never have to queue.
- Sorting out the (considerable) corridors and making them more child friendly.
- Converting a large room at the front into our party room with not only space for the little’uns to eat and be merry but, much more crucially, with enough seating around the edges for the parents too!
- Totally renovating the kitchen, ready for all the lovely, fresh, handcooked food and cakes that Anna will be making.
- Helping install the superfast broadband
- Oh, and before all that I’ll be installing our large coffee machine in pride of place in the middle of the bar. Of course, we want to have proper coffee from a local supplier for our customers (think of us as a superb cafe that also happens to have great children’s facilities), but the immediate priority is to get some proper coffee in place for me…I’ve had 4 weeks living on instant coffee or tea bags from the onsite kettle but enough is enough, sometimes you have to put your feet down :o)
Until next time
Steve
