Andy Blundell Restoration & Antiques

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Andy Blundell Restoration & Antiques

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BAFRA accredited furniture restorer and interiors conservator based in Cumbria. No job is too big or too small.

Along with my small team of highly trained and passionate antiques and interiors restorers, I carry out a variety of restoration work across the north of England and Scotland.

04/11/2026

I was going to post about a chair I recently restored.......but.....as I walked across the workshop tonight I saw that someone had taken over the office.
The office, is a very comfy, swivel, funky looking armchair in a corner of the workshop, which if I'm not doing emails or playing games in, is a second home to a fluffy bastard. I'm sure this post will get more likes than the chair.

31/10/2026

Happy workshop Halloween

29/10/2026

This has been a fun piece to repair and restore.
A 1960's Metamec Sunburst clock which had been badly damaged and then had some interesting repairs.
The restoration was purely for sentimental value for the relatives of the previous owner who apprently had a hobby of repairing clocks.
In a case like this, it's not about making it perfect it's about, keeping it's past alive, so I even worked with the original wire repairs to hold the broken mount together.
The brass and dial were cleaned, but the tarnish can still be seen, a new glass face was found on the internet along with a missing piece of teak, making a new quartz movement and hands to fit was the challenge, but after several days of settling up and then taking it apart again, I cracked it, and it's now off to a new home down under.
Metamec, were a British clock making company which started in 1947 and became one of the largest clock manufacturers in the UK.
The Sunburst design was pioneered in 1949 by George Nelson Associates for the Howard Miller Clock Company, USA,
Unlike iconic mid-century American clocks, there is no single, credited individual designer for the famous Metamec sunburst clocks. Instead, they were created by the anonymous in-house design team at the Metamec factory in East Dereham, Norfolk, England....... that team were totally...... GROOVY baby.

21/10/2026

A Ukrainian conservator I worked with a few years ago, once said to me after I mentioned I was moving house the next weekend.
"In my country, if you want something bad to happen to someone you hope they have to move house".
After thirteen weeks of being stranded at Lancaster (not a bad place to be stranded by the way) due to restrictions because of the low water levels and a couple of weeks blagging it, before the CRT start checking licence numbers and movement again.... I finally had to move.
This has to be the most pleasant way to move house, an hours cruise and another beautiful place to moor up, amazingly, getting close to the cut is still a massive problem due the fact the canal hasn't been properly dredged in decades and I heard from another boater the levels have dropped due to another breach towards Preston.

04/10/2026

Welly, welly, well, well, well..... after a social media hiatus, I decided to let you back into my world and already the post about Dude's Instagram page has more than double interest in views and likes than anything I've posted about me...... thanks for boosting my confidence.
Anyhow here goes.
I already posted about my first day of my London visit this week so here's what I did the following day, which may be of interest to some of you.
I woke to the sounds of the city in a dodgy air bnb in Camden on the Tuesday morning after seeing the band the night before..... I knew I was walking distance from Saint Pancras Station, so off I set around 8.30, not to the station but the St Pancreas Old Church, which has been on my must visit list for sometime.
St Pancras Old Church is known as one of the oldest places in the UK for Christian worship, and it seems no one is willing to put a date on the actual building as some of it may date back to the 4th century, quite a bit of it is medieval, then it was refurbed in the 17th and also the 19th century..... it's old ......OK.
The reason I wanted to visit, was to see the Hardy Tree, which sadly died and fell in 2022 , but another has been planted but I don't know what the plan is.
The original tree was said to have been planted some time around 1860. Shortly afterwards, Thomas Hardy( the author), for whom the tree is named, was involved in the exhumation of graves during his time studying as an architect to make way for the Midland Railway to run through the churchyard. The human remains were buried some where else, but the gravestones of those resumed were stacked and embedded around the base of the Ash tree as a memorial.
This is where it get really cool, one of the gravestones around the Hardy tree is that of John William Polidori, who wrote 'The Vampyre', the first published modern vampire story, which was inspired and accredited to and by Lord Byron, and Polidori is credited by some as the creator of the vampire genre of fantasy fiction.......if you didn't know Bauhaus, Bella Lugois is Dead.....is my world.
Byron had come up with the idea in a competition with friends who could make the scariest story up, one friend being Mary Shelly who went on to use her idea to write. Frankenstein.
Another grave/tomb in the St Pancras Old Churchyard is that of Mary Wollstonecraft who was 18th century radical thinker, philosopher and she was the author of ‘A Vindication of the Rights of Woman’, published 1792...... a proper feminism.......who guess what? she was the mother of Mary Shelly..... to much history in one place, I'll take me pills.... the church is also known due to a 4 beat combo band from Liverpool who had a photo shoot there in the 60's ......sorry I had to do the photo of me standing where Johm Lennon stood...... Also as I walked to Euston to get the 12.40 train up north I had breakie, popped in to a art gallery, a really cool book shop, bought some cool books and.......sod it ..... its rude not to go and read my Freedom of rights, Magna Carta in the British Library.... also saw some Beatles lyrics....and da vinci

02/10/2026

I do love Windsor Chairs, the perfect arm chair, which seem to have a life of there own as they quite often move due to the way someone has sat in them over a long period of time.
Also the fact their style and design differs from region to region.
These two are both from Lincolnshire and both did need a little attention and some life put back into their finish.

01/10/2026

I have always known that my followers have more interest in Dude, compared to the amazing places I work in, the amazing restoration I do and the historical pieces I work on.
I have found it hurtfull .......but Dude is one cute, friendly, lovable fluffy little bastard, who makes everyone he meets feel special......so living with him is a nightmare.
I have reactivated his Instagram account which had a few people following.... but could you pretty please like, follow and share his page, I will share photos every day which will make your day brighter because that is what he does. https://www.instagram.com/zuchon_dude_?stkn=OW15bm01Y2xlMGtt

30/09/2026

I've just had a quick 24 hour visit to the big smoke, London, and even if a whistle stop tour, I did want to see a couple of places that may also interest some of you.
I have recently be reading about Beau Brummel, so the first place I headed to was the entrance to the Piccadilly Arcade on Jermyn Street in the St James's area of London, where there is a statue of him, I felt Andy had to meet a Dandy.
Beau was described as the preeminent example of the dandy, and is remembered for as the inventor of the cravat and the modern men's suit and tie concept around 1800.
He was a close friend of the Prince Regent, the future King George IV, but after the two quarrelled and Brummell got into debt, he had to take refuge in France. Eventually, he died from complications of neurosyphilis in Caen.
I would have probably been Beau's idea of a nightmare as he was famously quoted saying, 'To be truly elegant one should not be noticed".
The next stop was a place Beau frequented, Pickering Place just around the corner from Beau's statue and a few meters away from St James Palace.
It was built around 1730 and this tiny courtyard has a wealth of history attached to it. Not only was it home to the Texan Republic’s embassy (until it joined the United States in 1845) and is the smallest square in Britain, but it is also the last place in London where a duel was fought! Apparently Beau Brummel fought a dual here.
From the late 18th century and early 19th century it was a den of iniquity and was notorious for its gambling dens, bear baiting and duels!
I love the fact it's still got the original panelled entrance and cast iron railings, it's now two very posh restaurants, but I'd be happy with a couple of candles and a bag of chips trying to imagine what debauchery went on in there.... probably best not to think to much.
Then on to the Victoria and Albert museum, I had a bit of a deja vue moment as I walked past my old South Kensington workshop just a few meters away from the V&A.
I love the Chihuly hanging glass above the foyer desk, even if does look like it needs a dust. I did exactly what I used to and I found a corner to sit in in the remarkable castings rooms...... and just feel overwhelmed by the huge beautiful casting... I did spend a couple of hours looking around and I was very chuffed with myself that I spotted some medieval graffiti, a protection burn mark on a 15th century French staircase and some protection dial mark on a 16th century door on display.
I think some of you know, I love history what ever the age, so the next hertaige land mark I visited was another place I have frequently visited since a teenager and that is the Coach and Horse's pub in Soho, a Grade II-listed, unrenovated time capsule featuring a substantially intact 1930s Taylor Walker interwar design.
The pub is possibly famous for all the wrong reasons as since the early sixties it was a second home to the Private Eye writing team, and home to the likes of Peter Cook, Willie Rushden and most notably Jeffrey Bernard who I did see a few times perched on a stool at the end of the bar near the gents..... of course the pub visit was for history research reasons on how the bar was originally finished and colour of the timber ..... no ales where drunk in the two hours of doing research.
Next was another old stomping ground and the reason for the visit, .....gig ......Hoodoo Gurus..... I'll tell you about the morning after in another post.

27/09/2026

Finally got to make some wax as a new tin arrived the other day.
Of course my wax is a secret recipe based on a recipe from a 200 year old cabinetmaking book.
I only use pure ingredients and pure bee's wax, I do have a fire safe cabinet which has a multitude of potions and chemicals, which are still legal to own if now illegal to sell and buy, and that's dependant on how the item is worded.
For example, I legally need a alcohol licence when buying the quantities of 100% industrial alcohol, but it's not a problem to buy by the gallon Shellac thinners, arsenic is very ilegal, but organic wood preserver is just fine to buy..... Now the next one baffles me, Red lead oxide, totally banned in the UK, but I can get it sent over from France no problem...... I hope you had a great weekend

22/09/2026

Hi, .....I'm back..... Due to bumping in to friends, clients and followers, who actually have told me they love my posts, I will again be posting about my work and Dude.
I did need some time out, and I have now decided NOT to close the workshop and business down, but to have a more balanced LIFE .....work... lifestyle.
I did find being on social media as a business quite a pressure, and meta haven't made it any easier, with all the AI guff....sometimes you just want to post a photo and Meta makes it a total 2hr nightmare you don't need.
So here are some before and after shots of a 17th Century staircase I restored last year, of course the builders wanted to rip it out, but fortunately the owners went with my advise, plan of action and trust that I could make it beautiful again.
I will be posting a variety of cool restoration projects I am now on with, including, cool stuff, old stuff, places I visit, Dude, funky stuff, narrowboat life, sunsets, Dude, some of the medieval graffiti apotropaic stuff that I keep finding, a really cool lake land chapel that I has said I can make beautiful again...........did I mention Dude?

Address

The Workshop
Penrith
CA119AF

Telephone

+447730520264

Website

https://andyblundellrestoration.co.uk/

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