Click through to All 4 and view online
The Restoration Man in Harrogate
◼ The elegant Grade II listed Grove Road Chapel, built in Harrogate in 1896 as a Wesleyan place of worship, was first featured in the UK TV network Channel 4’s series The Restoration Man in January 1916. This month it is again viewable on the web at the on-demand website All 4.
Cameras followed the three-year renovation and conversion into a family home, along with its associated Sunday School from 1905. George Clarke, the effusive presenter of Channel 4’s Restoration Man, describes this as “One of the best design episodes yet” – thanks largely to the eclectic tastes of Yorkshire property developer and culture vulture Mark Hinchliffe. For him, the chapel’s 6,500 sq ft across two floors, plus the school’s 3,700 sq ft represented not only a substantial financial investment but an emotional one too.
As Hinchliffe tells presenter George Clarke on camera: “You’ve got to fall in love first with the project, then think about the consequences afterwards.”
Discover more about the Chapel’s refurbishment on this legacy website as it followed the development
