When the family sold up in 1954 the house was cut into six flats, and the first thing the new owners did was roof the second patio in corrugated iron and rent it out as parking. It stayed that way for fifty-four years.
The effect on the building is the interesting part. In a house like this the patio is the cooling system. Hot air rises out of the open courtyard and pulls cooler air through the rooms behind it. Put a roof on it and the mechanism stops.
By 2007 the back rooms were unusable in the afternoon and two of them had been bricked off entirely. The surveyor's note from that year is pinned up behind reception and says, in effect, that the house had been given asthma.
Taking the iron off was the first thing the restoration did, before any of the pretty work. The difference was measurable within a week and the back rooms have not needed cooling since.
The east room, which had been the garage under that roof, took longer to find a use for. It is six tables and a bar now, and the cedar beams that were hidden above the iron are the best thing in it.