Chorley's Astley Hall faces £340k roof repair bill, council says

Repairs to the roof of Astley Hall will cost £340,000, Chorley Council says

Repairs to a 17th Century country hall's cottage roof will cost an "astronomical" £340,000, three times more than first estimated, a council has said.

Grade I listed Astley Hall in Chorley, Lancashire, reopened on Saturday after a two-year restoration.

However a Chorley Council meeting heard the cottage roof was in a "significant state of disrepair".

Contractors discovered the damage after removing slates as part of the revamp.

The bill had risen from £131,000.

Astley Hall, which functions as an art gallery and museum, underwent a £1.1m transformation to carry out vital repair works in 2020.

In September, the hall hosted the G7 Speakers' Summit of parliamentarians, which included the US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

A Chorley Council meeting heard how the budget for the cottage roof had been approved days before it reopened, the Local Democracy Reporting Service said.

Astley Hall, a Grade I listed house, has just undergone extensive refurbishment

Deputy council leader Peter Wilson said that it was "good fortune" that the state of the structure, which amounts to around 20% of the roof space of the entire hall, had been revealed before "serious damage occurred".

Council leader Alistair Bradley said that he was shocked when first presented with the "astronomical" figure.

He said the revised sum had initially been even higher, but was reduced, after the council requested a re-costing exercise to see what could be "parred out" of the planned works in order to get better value for money.

Mr Bradley said he had been surprised that the cottage roof was the only unforeseen expense to have been encountered in the wider Astley Hall regeneration project.

The cottage area will be used for storage and as a space for staff once the repairs, which will be funded by borrowing, are completed.

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