unexpected places continued: all out but the budgies

I haven't told you the worst about the purple (see previous blog). Our house was finished in 1872 or so, as part of a graceful Crescent. Light being at a premium in grey Glasgow, cupolas were installed to illuminate generous halls. The wall space is large, encompassing two floors, leading the eye forwards and upwards to show off the house's generous proportions. When we first moved in, we went mad and decided to give the house a present. We would wallpaper the hall in its entirety - and not just wallpaper, but Zoffany wallpaper in gold and blue. An investment? Rubbish. Just one of those splurging impulse designed to give you, post-ordering the stuff, several metaphorical heart attacks. Not my husband. The prospect of a hall papered from top to toe in Zoffany filled him with delight. Up it went. Jaws dropped.

For fourteen years the paper glowed and shone and gave the house a certain distinction. Then along comes a film crew and in two days it is gone. I gaped.

Now, let me make it plain at once. The slapping of paint on paper was not done surreptitiously. In the many meetings we had before the 'dresser' got going, changing our house from a family home into a, er, family home, we discussed exactly what they were going to do. But theory and practice are not quite the same. As the Zoffany sighed 'what did I ever do to you?' and gave up the ghost, I felt a vandal.

Good news is that there is a glorious thing called 're-instatement'. That's when they have to put your house back exactly as it was. Yup, paper and all. And then I wondered if we really wanted paper. I mean, did we? My husband was appalled and at once rushed off to get samples. 'Look!' he cried, 'Look how beautiful paper is! How can you even speak of paint?' In all the shenanigans - the decanting into a tiny flat, the depositing of the poor dogs into kennels, our son's room turned into a false kitchen during his exams, the downstairs loo deciding it didn't want any part in this nonsense, the neighbours' houses having to sport Christmas trees in June, to say nothing of the troublesome and difficult subject matter of the drama itself which caused us both to gulp - the only thing that has caused any actual friction in our household is wallpaper.

For those who want to know what the troublesome subject of the film is - it stars Gina MacKee (The Street, the Forsyte Saga, Notting Hill) and Jeremy Northam (Emma, The Tudors, Gosford Park) - I shall soon post a link to the press release. That's a whole other story, and leads me to wonder, if the production team had approached you for such a drama, would you have agreed?