Crafting couple appear in TV series

A COUPLE who turned an old pub into a craft centre and café are being featured on a TV show.

Jon Doughty and Kay Surman, who run Maker Space in Nuffield, are appearing on four episodes of Sarah Beeny’s New Country Lives on Channel 4 this week and next.

They are shown working on restoration and creative projects at the centre.

Mr Doughty, who previously worked in web design, and Ms Surman, a former Disney creative executive, moved from London in 2020 to follow their passion for crafts and creativity.

They took over the former Crown Inn at Gangsdown Hill opposite Nuffield Place, which dates back to the 17th century and is grade II listed.

The couple have lovingly restored it, turning it into a creative space. The TV show follows them transforming a derelict room into a workshop, creating a café from an old horse box and hosting a Christmas event for their workshop tutors.

Ms Surman said: “Jon has always been into property renovations. He did a massive refurbishment project on our previous house. He follows a massive online group who do that sort of thing and Sarah Beeny was one of them. He saw on her Instagram that she was doing this show so posted a comment just to say, ‘Oh, we’re doing this too’.

“We didn’t think anything of it at the time but then they reached out wanting to have a chat. We did a video call with them and next thing you know we’re signed up to do the TV show.”

Filming took place between July and December last year. A film crew of two came 15 times during that period.

Ms Surman said: “They came and did an interview-type piece initially looking at how we met and that sort of thing.

“The next time was us moving house — we moved from Maidenhead way to Hailey. It’s stressful enough when you’re moving anyway without having film cameras.

“We’ve got two pugs, so I had the dogs with me, walked round the corner through the gate and the dogs started barking with the cameras going and there were a couple of guys with a box asking me where to go. That was fun chaos.

“Sarah Beeny was really nice. She came in July last year at the beginning of the project to see the ‘before’. She came the third time too to look at what we were doing. We explained what our plans were and she gave advice, which was actually really cool.

“She asked, ‘Why are you doing it like that, have you thought about doing it this way, is that the best use of space?’. It almost made us take a step back and have a bit of time to think about it.”

Beeny couldn’t visit later in the filming process as she was having treatment for breast cancer. She has since been given the all-clear.

Ms Surman said: “Instead of her coming to do a concluding episode we did a sort of walk around on our own. That was weird, doing it ourselves.

“There were no disasters or anything — deadlines were the main pressure. One of the good things about the show is that it held us accountable. We did things ahead of time to keep in line with the filming. We would just let the crew know what we were doing and they would figure out how they were going to get here. If they could come on a certain day, we’d hold off on certain jobs that they wanted to see.”

Over the duration of the filming the show followed the couple running three separate projects. Ms Surman said: “We renovated upstairs, which was a complete wreck. That was in the original part of the building which was pretty grotty. The pub had been closed since 2013 and there were bird skeletons on the floor, mould and rot. It was so horrid.

“We had to get everything stripped. You have to be very careful how you do that because it’s a grade II listed building and you could lose all these original carpenters marks.

“We hadn’t intended to do that job so quickly, but the show moved us along a lot further because you’re almost being held to account. Jon loves doing property development. He really enjoys reimagining spaces, looking at a property and seeing the potential in it. He can’t wait to move on from this and do another project from scratch.”

About 90 per cent of Maker Space was completed by Mr Doughty, including the majority of the building’s furniture.

Ms Surman said: “We hired a local decorator and someone to do the boilers but the rest was him. It’s nice doing something for yourself.

“I loved my time at Disney but I always said when I left corporate life I wanted to do something with crafts.”

The couple’s Christmas craft show held in November was filmed for the programme. Ms Surman said: “Lots of our tutors came and had stalls selling things they had made, which was really lovely.”

Maker Space hosts a variety of workshops including silversmithing, quilting, spoon-carving and enamelling.

Ms Surman said: “We spoke to Sarah about how we got the café open before the craft stuff. The only thing is it is hard to get staff in the hospitality industry.

“Everyone has been so supportive of what we’ve done. I think people are really pleased that the building hasn’t been turned into a house and it’s still there for the community to use and enjoy.

“There’s no place that the community can really meet in Nuffield. We even host the parish council meetings. We get mainly locals and obviously our regulars and most of our customers are from within in a 10-mile radius. Nuffield Place doesn’t have a café, so we get people sent over from there too.”

For more information, visit https://themakerspace.co.uk

• New Country Lives is shown each weekday on Channel 4 at 5pm. All episodes will be made available on All4 catch-up.