Unsuspecting Couple Finds A Stunning Secret Hidden Beneath Their Carpet

Built in the 1830s, Kathryn and Phil’s property was a grand residence at the dawn of the Victorian era. But over the years, successive owners had made many changes in an effort to modify and modernize the historic home. Now, the plucky couple were attempting to bring it back to its former glory. But it’s not without its challenges...

Since August 2019, Kathryn and Phil have been documenting the journey on their Instagram page, @totheshireborn. And over time, their photographs have revealed a stunning transformation from neglected wreck to family home. But as the house has slowly taken shape, there have been some shocking surprises.

The biggest revelation of all came in September 2019, when the couple lifted up their hallway carpet to reveal an incredible secret. “I’m still slightly in shock after today,” Kathryn wrote. But what was it that they uncovered hidden inside their work-in-progress property? And what can it tell us about the history of this fascinating building?

According to an Instagram post made in August 2019, Kathryn and Phil moved into the property, located in the English county of Shropshire, at the beginning of 2018. Apparently, they weren't very clued-up on the history of the house – although they did know that the oldest parts dated back to 1830. So, as you can imagine, their discovery under the carpet was pretty special. 

From the outside, the house appears to be in decent condition – even in the couple’s early photographs. It’s only when Kathryn posts historic images of the property that you can see just how much things have changed. As it turns out, everything from elaborate greenhouses to mature rose gardens have disappeared over the years.

Inside, though, the passing of time is much more obvious. When Kathryn and Phil first called the property home, all of the appliances were broken. And there was no central heating system, either. Instead, the couple would resort to lighting the old Aga as a way of keeping warm at night. 

Slowly but surely, Kathryn and Phil have begun to turn their neglected Shropshire manor into a beloved family home. In the grounds, flowerbeds that were once empty and overgrown are now bursting with colorful lupin and foxglove blooms. And even the old rose garden is now enjoying a new lease on life.

That’s nothing compared to the transformation that has gone on behind closed doors. After sanding floors, fixing leaky roofs, and uncovering fireplaces, Kathryn and Phil were ready to host their first Christmas party in December 2019. But that was just the beginning of an epic restoration project that is still ongoing today.

As the couple worked, they learned more and more about the historic property that they had chosen to make their home. They discovered, for example, that during WWII, the building was turned into a school for evacuees from Kent. And on the 50th anniversary of V.E. Day, many of them had returned to the house to meet up.

On another occasion, Kathryn posted a photograph of the domestic workers who would have once helped to run their sprawling home. It seems the previous owners would have had at least seven members of staff – including a head butler and gardener. Quite different to the current inhabitants, then, who were attempting an ambitious project practically on their own.

As renovations continued, Kathryn even discovered a cache of historic letters. They were written to a past resident back in 1847 – less than 20 years after the house was first built. Thanks to a transcription provided by a fellow Instagram user, she was able to decipher the cursive text. And, as it turns out, the note contained an intriguing detail.

“But to my business, you must know, I have a great wish for your coming to see me, and thus I have schemed it,” the letter, which was addressed to someone named Derwas, read. “There is a coach that leaves the Talbot for the White Hart, Bath.” So far, so normal. But then, the writer signed off with a bizarre warning.

“Do not bring with you either the Bear or the Monkey. I have no room for them,” the letter concluded. Were these exotic animals really once kept as pets in this Shropshire home? Or were these merely nicknames that only sound strange when taken out of context? As Kathryn herself has no idea, we might never learn the truth.

Don’t worry, though: the renovation has revealed some more tangible treasures as well. In December 2019, Kathryn posted a photograph of flames flickering in a beautiful open fireplace. While hanging up the Christmas decorations, she explained, she had decided to take a look behind a boarded-up area – and discovered an ingenious contraption known as a Baxi Burnall.

According to the website Twentieth Century Fireplaces, the Baxi Burnall is a type of heating system that was popularized in the wake of WWII. With resources still scarce, the British government sought to promote efficient ways of keeping the household warm. And these deep-set grates, which draw air from underneath the floorboards to fuel a wood fire, must have seemed like the perfect solution.

Unlike many of the projects in Kathryn and Phil’s home, the fireplaces proved relatively simple to restore to working order. But other areas of the home have taken years to complete. And in February 2021, the couple took on a new challenge when they welcomed Minnie, their newborn baby girl.

Today, the Shropshire manor of Kathryn and Phil’s dreams is starting to take shape. In the drawing room, the beautiful oak floor has been restored to its former glory after spending decades smothered by thick carpet. After a long process of sanding, buffing, and polishing, the results are really quite spectacular.

Meanwhile, towards the top of the house, Kathryn and Phil have created a beautiful nursery for Minnie, complete with bespoke furniture and a vintage rocking horse. But how long until their restoration project is finally complete? Well, with 61 rooms to get on with, plus the sprawling grounds, it’s unlikely to be any time soon. 

As of August 2021, Kathryn and Phil have more than 65,000 followers on their Instagram page. And it’s certainly easy to see the appeal of their warts-and-all account of renovating their beautiful home. But the highlight so far has been the stunning secret that the couple discovered when they lifted their garish hallway carpet.

On September 8, 2019, Kathryn uploaded a photograph to Instagram that captured lots of people’s attention. Apparently, the couple had decided to spontaneously tackle one of the biggest projects in the whole house. The accompanying caption read, “I’m not quite sure what compelled me to think, ‘let’s take a look at floors today’ while we’re in the middle of trying to finish off loads of other jobs.” 

Nevertheless, Kathryn and Phil, along with their helpers, chose that day to roll up the aging hallway carpet and see what was underneath. Generally speaking, it was a grand-looking room, with a twisting staircase and wide arches dominating the space. But the bright-red floor covering was clearly not in line with the couple’s taste.

According to Kathryn, it wasn’t the first time that they'd decided to take a peek. She wrote, “We’ve lifted a corner of the carpet before when we first moved in, and we found a concrete type surface so we just left them and thought the carpet was fine until we start decorating this area of the house.”

Eventually, though, curiosity got the better of the couple. “Today Dad just lifted the corner of the carpet in a different place, and I still can’t believe what we found,” Kathryn wrote. There, hiding beneath the dated floor covering, was a beautiful design of geometric tiles, still remarkably intact despite their obvious age.

“The floor in the main hall is amazing,” Kathryn wrote. Desperate to reveal the extent of their discovery, the couple continued pulling up the carpet into the middle of the night, exposing the stunning floor underneath. As it turns out, the beautiful design, featuring red, black, and gold tiles, covers the entire hallway of the Shropshire home.

Laid out in a mesmerizing geometric design, the tiles also feature flowers and crosses decked out in black and gold. Over the moon with their find, Kathryn and Phil were determined to return the flooring to its original condition. But like many aspects of their renovation project, this was no simple task.

Later that same day, Kathryn uploaded another post to Instagram, showing the hallway as it was before their startling discovery. She wrote, “It’s amazing, I still can’t believe it’s here. There’s lots to tidy up on it as it was covered with glue, underlay, carpet grippers, and self-leveling compound in parts.” 

And in a video uploaded to TikTok, the couple revealed exactly how challenging the process had been. After removing the carpet, Kathryn, Phil, and their helpers spent hours prying up the self-leveling compound. Then, they cleaned up the tiles and began to contemplate the long and painstaking restoration process.

Unfortunately, some of the tiles had broken or gone missing over the years. Turning detective, Kathryn managed to track down the original manufacturers – Maw & Co., a local firm that specialized in ceramic tiles. Apparently, they’d used a technique known as encaustic painting in order to create the striking designs.

First developed in the medieval era, encaustic tiles are produced by pressing multiple shades of clay on top of one another. Back then, the tiles were used to make the decor inside buildings such as monasteries and cathedrals a bit more colorful and interesting. And in the Victorian era, when Gothic Revival architecture came into fashion, the wealthy sought to recreate these distinctive ceramics.

In order to meet demand, Victorian firms began manufacturing encaustic tiles. But the process was lengthy and expensive, which restricted sales of the ceramics to the wealthy. Before long, though, companies landed on a cheaper alternative – making monochrome designs that could be laid out in geometric patterns.

With a cost-efficient means of production, buoyed by the Industrial Revolution, geometric tiling became popular throughout Victorian England. And even today, many period houses still feature these stunning designs. But the tiles uncovered by Kathryn and Phil are made in the true encaustic style, meaning that whoever ordered them must have been fairly well-off.

In an Instagram post dated July 2021, Kathryn shared some more intriguing details that she had managed to piece together about the tiled floor. It is believed the feature was installed around 1860, for example, which is when the popularity of these tiles was at its height. And thankfully, no traces of asbestos were found in the pieces, which can often be a threat when renovating historic homes.

Unfortunately, Kathryn couldn’t tell if the tiles had been decorated with any family emblems or heraldic crests that might shed light on the lives of the previous owners. But the couple did learn something else from the elaborate flooring. On closer inspection, they realized that parts of the design seemed to vanish beneath the skirting boards, suggesting that the hallway had once been laid out in a different way.

In the 1960s, Kathryn believes, two of the rooms leading off of the hallway were knocked through, their separate doorways blocked up and swapped for one large entrance. But despite the appeal of this open-plan design, the couple decided to return this part of the house to how it looked before. And by July 2021, they had almost completed the renovation – including filling in any gaps in the tiled flooring.

Although Maw & Co. shut its doors in 1970, it reopened in 2001 and continues to produce ceramics to this day. In the end, though, Kathryn and Phil didn’t need to reach out to them for replacements. Instead, a fellow Instagram user came through with a generous offer, providing the couple with the tiles that they needed to breathe new life into their beautiful floor.

In an Instagram post dated July 10, 2021, Kathryn explained that work on the floor was almost complete – just one last wash was needed. But she also had a far more surprising announcement to make. By this point, word of the couple’s incredible discovery had begun to spread, with one video of the tiles having been watched over 18 million times.

Thanks in no small part to this viral popularity, @totheshireborn now has thousands of followers on Instagram cheering along as Kathryn and Phil renovate their home. But what’s next for the ambitious couple? Looking at their Instagram, it seems that in August 2021, they were adding the finishing touches to their head-turning entrance hall.

And at around the same time, the couple was also tackling the exterior of their Shropshire manor. In an Instagram post dated August 17, Kathryn wrote: “When one door closes another opens. That is definitely something that is true about this house. We’ve been discovering more potentially blocked up doorways and finding more things open.”

When they started out on their journey back in 2018, Kathryn and Phil could never have guessed where it would take them. Certainly, they did not expect to find a Victorian tiled floor hiding underneath their hallway carpet. But for Kerrie and Bleddyn Jackson, their own renovation project on their centuries-old Welsh property turned up a discovery far more unnerving than Victorian tile — and it all began with a hole in the wall.

Now, you’re probably wondering what on earth greeted Bleddyn when he peered into that dusty hole, right? Well, the first thing that jumped out at him – thankfully, not literally – was a stash of old boots. Totally random and unexpected, we know! But as the couple delved deeper into their home’s past, the eerie truth about the objects started to emerge.

Even when Bleddyn first made this bizarre discovery, it was obvious something didn’t quite add up. According to the couple, there were eight shoes inside the hole. But all of them were meant to be worn by left feet. That’s not all, either. While some were designed for male adults, others were fit for children.

As if the shoes weren’t weird enough, Bleddyn soon realized that more eerie objects were hidden away in this crevice. Yep, alongside the footwear, he uncovered a hat and pieces of a gun barrel. But perhaps the freakiest find of all was the skull, which looked like it had come from a horse.

Naturally, these discoveries left the Jacksons with a lot of questions. Their house dates back to the 16th century. So had the shoes, gun, hat and horse skull been resting there for all that time? And, perhaps more importantly, why on earth were they there in the first place?

The Jacksons were understandably confused by the things that they’d discovered in their home. So, the couple started to do some research. And it wasn’t long before they came across information that seemed apt. Long ago, their findings stated, people used objects like the ones they’d found in order to protect against wicked forces.

So, the couple’s house – which is located in the northern Welsh market town of Denbigh – may have something of a dark history. In any case, it certainly has an interesting one, as is illustrated by its status as a “listed building.” In the United Kingdom, this basically means that the structure is protected by the government because of its historical importance.

Apparently, these structures may not be altered, extended or destroyed without specific permission from the authorities. They must also exhibit most of the features that were present when it was first raised. And the website British Listed Buildings notes that there are almost half a million of these historically important structures in the U.K.

The Jacksons’ house, then, fits the bill quite perfectly. Known by the name Plas Uchaf, the home and its grounds have a long history which stretches back centuries. British Listed Buildings notes that it was initially the home of a wealthy English settler family called the Goodmans. But ownership of the property was passed on several times over the following generations.

The property’s core remains the same today as when it was first built, though a number of extensions have been added since then. According to the website, a staircase was installed around the year 1680 at the behest of one Meredith Wynne. And it’s actually under here that the creepy objects were first discovered.

Meredith’s child Edward later took on responsibility of the estate and made his own renovations. But these works were apparently quite cosmetic. In much more recent times, an entire wall of the house had to be knocked and built up again. Though generally speaking, the main home has retained its original qualities.

The aforementioned website notes that Plas Uchaf became a Grade II listed building back in 1952. Apparently, the reason for its status was because of the property’s “special historic interest as a fine vernacular unit-planned sub-medieval gentry house with good surviving interior features.”

Plas Uchaf has actually been in Bleddyn’s family for generations, and he has been renovating it with the help of his wife. In doing so, the couple have ended up delighting in the exploration of their historic home. They’ve even set up an Instagram page dedicated to showing off the incredible things that they’ve found there!

Among the many discoveries made at Plas Uchaf is a striking print of a young Queen Victoria behind some shutters. The Jacksons explained on their Instagram page that they hadn’t touched them since moving in, so they had no idea the picture was even there. It was only when a laborer was at work in the room that the creepy image was spotted.

Elsewhere, the couple managed to reveal the contents of an old safe that had been in the house. The object appeared to have been cleared of anything valuable when the Jacksons found it, but it did contain things like bottles and broken chains. The Jackson’s opined on Instagram that wages meant for employees at the house and its surrounding farmlands may once have been kept inside the safe.

Another find that provided an insight into the property was a collection of old, musty papers discovered in the granary. The couple claimed that these were receipts related to activities that were once going on throughout the farm. It looks like the most recent of these pages was from 1941, so we can safely say that they’re pretty old!

The grounds beyond the main house are also full of interesting signs of the estate’s former life. Among the relics discovered are an old rusty kettle and a similarly weathered pan. The family suspects that this latter implement may have once been used to make traditional Welsh cakes.

But what else have the Jackson’s stumbled across? Well, the couple have found an old boot which is in a state of decay and sprouting plant life. On top of that, it seems that the grounds are littered with a huge array of old glass bottles. The family have accumulated quite the collection of these containers, which come in a variety of shapes and colors.

Other discoveries have apparently been much more difficult to categorize. In the couple’s 17th-century walled garden they found several artifacts in the shape of butterflies. Based on the objects’ weight and texture, it’s suspected that they were made of lead. Their purpose, however, is something of a mystery.

On the creepier side of things, there have been plenty of old and eerie artworks discovered in Plas Uchaf. Some are portraits of people from another era, while others are religious works or pieces depicting important historical events. And a number of the pictures are so old that they’re in a state of rot.

But what about the main building’s attic rooms? Well, they too have an immensely rich history. The Jacksons explained in one of their Instagram posts that these upper rooms were once inhabited by prisoners of war from Italy. These people had apparently ended up at Plas Uchaf during WWII to help out on the farm.

The attic rooms in the granary also exhibit signs of their past life in the form of graffiti. People working at the property left their mark on its walls – leaving their names and other pieces of personal information. Incredibly, the Jacksons explained that the oldest etching they had found to date was from 1888!

Another piece of interesting graffiti can be found on the grounds. The nature of this etching, however, is a little different, as it was carved into a tree. It reads, “D.W. 1961.” The Jacksons have no idea who this might have been, but they’d most certainly like to find out.

Among the more chilling discoveries made at Plas Uchaf and its grounds was a faceless figurine of a man. The Jacksons wrote on their Instagram page, “Eagle-eyed oldest boy just found this heavy little lead chap!” Take a look at the picture: its aged appearance has a decidedly haunting quality, doesn’t it?

Creepy as this figurine was, though, the most frightening discovery at Plas Uchaf was undoubtedly the haul of objects under the stairs. Speaking to WalesOnline, Kerrie Jackson explained how they had come across these strange items. She said, “Bleddyn was working in the room next door when he saw something through a hole he’d made in the wall.”

Kerrie went on, “The staircase had been built across a sealed up medieval doorway that once connected different parts of the house. And the void underneath it had become exposed by the repairs being carried on the old timber frame. It was very eerie to peer into the darkness and make out all the objects inside. And, initially, we could only see a couple of shoes through the rubble.”

“... As we kept pulling them out, more and more were found, until, eventually, we’d lined up eight odd shoes...,” Kerrie explained. Plus, they were all different sizes, with some fit for children and others for grownups. There’s no question that this was weird, as was the discovery of a woolen hat and bits of a gun. But the fact that the collection of items also included an equine skull really made things quite terrifying!

The Jacksons were understandably baffled by the things that they’d stumbled upon. So, they turned to the internet in search of answers. And the results were chilling. It appears that the items may have been placed under the stairs by people who’d been terrified by sinister and mystical forces.

Kerrie told WalesOnline, “There’s an old superstition that says witches would enter homes ‘between’ places such as staircases, or at twilight or the chiming of midnight. People believed that by leaving out items such as shoes, witches or demons would be attracted to the scent left by the wearer. And once they entered the shoe or boot, they were unable to reverse back out and were therefore trapped.”

“Other theories suggest that perhaps they would become so distracted by the novelty of the find that they would leave the family alone,” Kerrie continued. “There are also lots of notions about why anyone would conceal horse skulls in houses, and we wondered if there was perhaps a connection to the Mari Lwyd.”

The Mari Lwyd is actually an old pagan winter tradition which continues today. During this event, the men of a town dress up and parade a horse’s skull on a pole. They then take it to local homes, where they request entry for food and drink through the medium of song. The houses’ owners are then expected to deny them access, and the two groups continue in song until one gives up. Interestingly, if the homeowners are the ones to relent, they then have to invite the group in and dine them.

Though its true origins are difficult to pin down, Mari Lwyd is widely linked with Christmas nowadays. The practice’s roots, though, are said to go further back in time than Christianity. This suggests that people may have been parading horses’ skulls around for several millennia now. If nothing else, that is a testament to the power of tradition!

In any case, it’s unclear whether or not the skull found in the Jacksons’ home was related to Mari Lwyd. But one person who saw the pictures of the haul on Instagram shared their thoughts on all those shoes. Apparently, the fact that they were all left-footed was meaningful because of an odd religious quirk.

The user commented, “The left shoes are also of significance. The whole thing of ‘the left hand side being against God’ was very much a thing. And [it] still [persists] in some forms to this day – hence why you hear stories of some teachers forcing children to write with their right hands. Left-handed shoes would have been seen as a very inviting place for a disembodied spirit to stay the night!”

So, whoever left all these items under the stairs was probably very superstitious. And they would have likely been relieved to learn that the Jacksons soon put all the stuff back where they found it! Indeed, witches wouldn’t be getting into the house any time soon.

But did the Jacksons put all these things back under the stairs in the spirit of tradition – or were they superstitious themselves? Well, apparently it was the former. Kerrie told WalesOnline, “We’re not worried about [the objects] being there and we’re not spooked by it at all.”

The Jacksons are committed to documenting all the oddities to be found in their home. But they’re equally determined to preserve the spirit of the property’s past. For that reason, they try to place their discoveries back where they found them so that future generations can experience the thrill of coming across the items themselves.

Speaking to WalesOnline, Jackson elaborated on this idea and revealed her family’s motivations for adhering to it. She said, “We quite often come across quirky things around this old house that really connect us to the past. We believe it’s important to record what we find and then return them for future generations to discover.”

In future years, Plas Uchaf will be defined by the influence of Kerrie and her family – especially in light of the renovations that they’re undertaking. And she is mindful of this, naturally. Kerrie explained, “It does make us wonder what future inhabitants of this place will make of the things we’ll end up leaving behind.”

So far, the Jacksons have made a huge number of discoveries at Plas Uchaf – both inside and outside the property. There’s also no sign that the amazing finds are likely to dry up any time soon. And as they continue to renovate and explore the place, who knows what else they’ll stumble upon?