'Our French farmhouse was rebuilt by hundreds of helping hands'

About an hour south of Calais sits the rural village of Saint-Georges (Pas-de-Calais), home to New Zealander Donna Gauvin and her English partner Nik Meergans.

It seems an unlikely spot to attract foreigners, yet the crumbling farmhouse captivated them and has drawn over 145 volunteers across the years, collaborating to create a unique, authentic home.

“When we lived in Sussex, we used to visit the Côte d'Opale regularly,” says Donna, “and we’d both always dreamed of a holiday home in France, where Nik could have time and space to work on his pottery and sculptures.

“In 2007, we’d organised several visits over one weekend, but rather embarrassingly, we bought the first one we looked at!

“It was a real coup de foudre. That same weekend, we bought the farmhouse and called an agent to put our UK house on the market.

Including the fees, the couple paid €109,000, which they thought was an incredible bargain.

“The neighbours thought we were insane, though! The main house had a new roof and a small bathroom with hot water, but the kitchen consisted of a sink, a tap and two cupboards, so we had an oven in the lounge for the first couple of years!”

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A collaborative process

Dating from 1890, the 90m² farmhouse was set in 1,800m² grounds with a large barn, two outbuildings and stables, whose cows had provided the village with butter right up to the 1970s.

These stables have since become a B&B room, guest bedroom, and a small gîte whose kitchen has an eye-catching stained-glass splashback, a collaboration between Donna, Nik and Susan Watson, an American who was the resident stained-glass artist at Dollywood, Tennessee for over 20 years.

“Susan first came to us via Workaway and is now a lifelong friend,” says Donna.

“We joined Workaway in 2011 after reading an article in The Guardian, because it seemed such an amazing project: volunteers come and help with your house or garden in return for board and lodging.

“We only take two people at a time for one week, but in total we’ve hosted over 145 different people since we began, aged between 17 and 62, from more than 35 different countries. 

“We’ve learned so much about different cultures, sharing meals and laughs together. Initially, we were so grateful for their help that we used to give them our bedroom to sleep in, while we slept on an unfinished floor in the stables! These days we do have a guest room dedicated to our volunteers, which is far more practical.”

In the early days, volunteers were involved in a range of projects, from helping to convert the former coal store into an extended pantry to transforming the large barn into Nik’s workshop.

“These days, our volunteers mostly help us to keep the garden in order, and while 90% of them don’t have any particular skills, they all have a great deal of enthusiasm!” says Donna.

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Reclaimed and handmade

By choice, the renovation process has prioritised traditional methods and local, reclaimed materials.

The beautiful inlaid ‘encaustic’ cement floor tiles came from a local house that was being updated – Nik arranged to dismantle two barns nearby in return for keeping the original materials.

Many of the kitchen cupboards in the farmhouse are still awaiting doors as these will all be made by Nik, and the bathroom wall tiles throughout the property are also handmade, all of which add to the unique character of the house and its outbuildings.

Learning and adapting

Although their initial plans of self-sufficiency proved too ambitious, the couple does have a wood burner that provides all their hot water and under-floor heating, and their rainwater harvesting system can collect around 4,000 litres, connected to various hoses in the garden.

“We have no mortgage, grow a lot of our own food, we do nearly all the building work ourselves and with Workaway volunteers, but you still need an income,” says Donna.

“Alongside his woodworking and pottery, Nik takes on building projects; we have the gîte and B&B, and we run language-immersion courses on site.

“Thanks to the garden, the solid building materials and ecological practices, we can enjoy a high-quality lifestyle on a low budget. We really can’t imagine living anywhere else: this is definitely home.”

What is torchis?

When Nik and Donna bought the farmhouse, one of the architectural elements in urgent need of repair was the torchis, a rustic render similar to wattle and daub.

Donna and Nik learned the technique so they could repair all the torchis walls themselves.

“Torchis is effectively clay or mud mixed with straw or hay.

“We simply took the fallen torchis debris from our place and other properties whose owners had chosen to modernise their render, and reconstituted it by soaking it in water.

“On top, we apply a lime render, which we’ve learned to make, adding chopped flax to bind it.”