misogyny – at one point she even had to ask workers to leave the site. “It’s still a male-dominated industry and it’s not very often that a young female runs the site,” she explains. The first scaffolders she hired refused to acknowledge her as the project manager and had to be asked to leave, while other contractors made occasional derogatory comments. “There were a few moments like that, but I also had some really golden people that were super helpful,” she adds. “I think some took pity on me because I didn’t understand the lingo!” Aside from the general running of the site and


organisation of contractors and ordering of materials, Patsy’s role consisted of a lot of ferrying materials to keep the process moving. “I felt like doing that meant they were never able to take their foot off the gas, because I was just constantly giving them the next thing they needed!” Responsibility for ordering materials varied between Patsy and contractors, but she would price check


may/june 2022


anything she wasn’t ordering, to ensure the prices being quoted were reasonable. “If I could save any money then I was looking to do that,” she says. The oak frame company, Enville Oak, supplied everything needed for its construction, and her groundworker helped with the ordering of bricks as and when required. This was a slight frustration as she says that the bricklayers didn’t always say quickly enough that they were running out of supplies. Patsy took care of ordering materials such as plasterboard, as well as cutting and installing the insulation herself. “I was really buzzing when I got the certificate to say that the house was well insulated,” she says proudly. It was always Patsy’s intention to continue working and not take time off for the build. She set herself an office up in the stables – demolished at the end of the project – but ended up being furloughed in March 2020. “It was kind of a blessing in some ways because I could be here all the time,” she says. She returned


www.sbhonline.co.uk 81


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68  |  Page 69  |  Page 70  |  Page 71  |  Page 72  |  Page 73  |  Page 74  |  Page 75  |  Page 76  |  Page 77  |  Page 78  |  Page 79  |  Page 80  |  Page 81  |  Page 82  |  Page 83  |  Page 84