Chester House Estate: Delayed heritage farm site opens

A £14.5m heritage site has opened 17 years after it was bought by a now defunct council.

Chester House Estate, in Northamptonshire, was bought by Northamptonshire County Council in 2004.

The site has evidence of human activity from more than 10,000 years ago and Iron Age and Roman settlements.

North Northamptonshire Council's Kerry Purnell said: "It's been a very bumpy and challenging journey."

The house near Irchester, which was built near the site of a walled Roman town, was severely damaged by a fire in 2010.

In 2013, Northamptonshire County Council was awarded £4m from the Heritage Lottery Fund to turn the 45-acre (18 hectare) site into a visitor attraction.

The authority provided £4.9m towards the original budget of £11m, with the rest coming from other sources, and later that year work began on the house.

When the council ran into financial difficulties in 2017 it continued funding the increased costs to prevent it having to pay back the money to the Heritage Lottery Fund.

Ms Purnell said the project was delayed further when the contractor, the Shaylor Group, went into administration, in 2019.

She said a new contractor was found at the beginning of 2020, but then work was delayed again because of the pandemic.

Earlier this year Northamptonshire County Council was replaced by two unitary authorities, including North Northamptonshire Council.

Ms Purnell said it was "so exciting" to be able to welcome visitors to the site, which now has an archaeological archive, shopping court, restaurant and accommodation.

Commercial activities on the site, including a conference and wedding venue, "can fund the really important education, and community outreach programme", Ms Purnell said.

She added it would also allow them to "continue to explore the site further" with more archaeological excavation planned over the coming years.

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