Do no harm is actually the watchword of the medical profession but it is appropriate in how we view our Estate.

The Hall
When we bought the Hall almost 30 years ago it was in desperate need of investment and maintenance. We have spent over £3m on ensuring the Hall is kept in immaculate condition. Each year we spend over £500K on maintenance. We actually won an Award for our conservation work. We buy oak for use in coming years, likewise reclaimed hand-made, hand-clamped bricks for repair work. We have a loyal hard working team of artisans who are experienced in working with oak, lead and the like.

Trees
Some people have a fixed impression that we have cut down a number of trees. Some have had to come down because they were rotten or diseased or blew down in gales. In reality we have planted over 200 new trees. We do not mean little trees but semi-mature trees that are already well established and a decent size.

The Grounds
We have a large team of professional gardeners and grounds people who maintain all our grounds. We have invested considerable amounts in flowers and shrubs. We ensure we have modern machines to help our staff. Anyone who walks around our grounds cannot fail to see how beautiful they look and how well maintained they are.

New buildings
We reckon we spend about twice as much per square foot creating our new facilities than others may do. This is because we always use reclaimed, hand-made, hand-clamped bricks - not new bricks. We use oak wherever possible, not softwood. We believe in creating to the highest quality. We build for the long term. We expect all our buildings to still be in existence and in good order in 100 years time.

The Estate Perimeter Walls
In order to ensure our boarding pupils do not wander off the Estate and cause a nuisance, to ensure the safety and well being our of children and to ensure "undesirables" do not cause us a nuisance, we have spent over £1.5m creating a complete circular perimeter wall to the Estate. We acknowledge that local feeling was not happy with the height of the wall along the pupil footpath and around our wooded area. We have voluntarily agreed with Harrogate Council to lower the height of these walls to no more than two metres.

The Road!
The upgrade of the road from the Estate to the Boroughbridge main road should be completed by the end of August. This work has been paid for in full by the Estate owners. The much improved, wider and safer road will mean all traffic to and from the Estate, our Schools etc are able to go straight to the Boroughbridge road and not through local villages. We apologise for the inconvenience the work has caused and hope you will like the finished road.