He never promised his wife a rose garden but now she’s got one of the best beds in town.
Mike Phillips and Marina Shaw bought Huddersfield’s best-known mansion, Banney Royd, in July 2011 for £1.9m and have ploughed thousands of pounds into restoring it and its almost seven acres of gardens to their former glory.
The couple have allowed the Examiner an exclusive glimpse inside the house on Halifax Road, Edgerton, which once went on the market for, in Huddersfield, an unprecedented £5m.
Banney Royd, which is Grade One Listed and has 10 bedrooms, was built by legendary architect Edgar J Wood in 1902 and has been described as “the largest and most elaborate house of Wood’s career.”
It was used as a teachers’ centre for many years before being sold off by Kirklees Council to private buyers in 1995.
Marina and Mike, who are passionate about architectural heritage, had been looking for somewhere special to live but couldn’t find a house with acres of elaborate, formal gardens.
Although they readily admit they are no experts they wanted a home where they could look out of its windows and find pleasing views aplenty.
And the last words to describe the gardens when they moved in over four years ago were ‘elaborate’ or ‘formal’.
‘Overgrown’ and ‘derelict’ come closer.
Fortunately, help was at hand in the shape of Marina’s older brother Allen who immediately set about the task with gusto.
He said: “I had to dig the rose garden out with a pick axe and there were brambles at least 5ft tall.
“You couldn’t walk down the steps to the tennis lawns – they were completely overgrown with brambles and sticky willy (otherwise known as Galium aparine).”
One of their priorities was restoring the rose garden and soon 150 new roses had been planted – and most have bloomed.
Another area to get special attention were the tennis lawns.
Marina, a mother-of-six, said: “They were very badly overgrown.
“I remember looking out one day and as we were showing someone round and I saw a deer peering back at me as if to say: ‘who invited you here?’!
“We did quite a lot of work, both in the garden and in the house, in the first six months and there’s always more to do.
“It’s just constant maintenance.”
More than 180 tonnes of rubble have been shifted and there is more to take away.
She added: “With the rose garden you can still see, for example, where there were more beds at one time so we will probably look at restoring them eventually.”
Another project is to further develop a proper organic vegetable garden as the couple explore becoming self-sufficient.
One part of the gardens is devoted to a hen run and the couple have kept pigs and turkeys in the past.
Marina said: “I spend a lot of time at home whereas Mike tends to be away more, playing golf etc, so I do very much enjoy being able to look out of the rooms and see beautiful gardens.
“That’s the way the house was designed so almost wherever you are in it you can see something precious.”
And if she ever needs additional help she has it right under her nose in the form of two of her five sons, Ben Phillips, 21, and his brother Marc Shaw who run Banney Royd Gardening Services.
