In January 2015 Dick and Angel Strawbridge embarked on the journey of a lifetime when they swapped their cosy two-bedroom flat in East London for a derelict château with 12 acres of land in the Loire valley. The charming, inspiring and remarkable full story of Dick and Angel Strawbridge's first year at the Ch a teau-de-la-Motte Husson.

Their enthusiasm for the hard work is admirable, and their work ethic is amazing, but also their creativity and vision for what is possible is so interesting. Sharing their full journey for the first time, A Year at the Château <\/i>follows Dick and Angel from when they first moved to France in the depths of winter and found bedrooms infested with flies, turrets inhabited by bats, the wind rattling through cracked windows, and just one working toilet, which flushed into the moat, through to the monumental efforts that went into readying the château for their unforgettable wedding and their incredibly special first Christmas. because I don't want to renovate a castle of my own (let alone do TV shows to make it possible—no shade, and I'm delighted that other people are doing it, but being on television is not any version of my dream job! They worked through it, supported each other, and created a fantasy world for themselves and anyone lucky enough to have an encounter at the Chateau. A lot of the photos seem to focus on the couples wedding, even though it was beautiful and it is a focus on their business, I felt the readers probably wanted to see the progress of each of the rooms that were spoken about instead.Sharing their full journey for the first time, A Year at the Chateau follows Dick and Angel from when they first moved to France in the depths of winter and found bedrooms infested with flies, turrets inhabited by bats, the wind rattling through cracked windows, and just one working toilet, which flushed into the moat, through to the monumental efforts that went into readying the chateau for their unforgettable wedding and their incredibly special first Christmas. There were a lot of technical details mentioned by Dick, which was good, but again a lot of that was covered in the tv version. I would love to be adopted by them if they wanted an old kid 🤣😂 I mean I couldn’t do a few things that they do but everything else is perfect. Like many Brits, Dick and Angel had long dreamed of living in France, but where others might settle for a modest bolthole in the French countryside, the Strawbridges fell in love with a 19th-century fairytale chateau, complete with 45 rooms, seven outbuildings, 12 acres of land and its own moat. And not from a script but Angel and Dicks own opinions on how work and life progressed on the move and building work.

We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others. As I wind down from lunch with the family, and take a brief moment to relax and breathe before I start preparing the pastry for the Tarte Citron for our New Year’s Eve dinner party guests, I thought I’d pop in and wish you a very happy New Year!Their love for each other, their families and their chateau shines through with this book being dedicated to Arthur and Dorothy.