FEATURE
GREEN DREAM HANNAH SANDERS MEETS A FAMILY REALISING THEIR AMBITION TO BUILD THE MOST ECO-FRIENDLY HOME IN SHEFFIELD. t’s the greenest house in Sheffield... and until now it has probably been one of the city’s best-kept secrets. Mention Pinegrove Country Club to most people and, if they remember it at all, they will recall a sports and social club in Stannington that had a few very successful years back in the 1980s and ‘90s. It faded from public consciousness after going out of business, falling into disrepair and being subject to a series of arson attacks. But this mouldering venue was the unlikely site chosen by local businessman Mike Haver to create a stunning, self-contained, ecofriendly family home.
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The derelict Pinegrove Country Club
106 Westside | www.sheffieldvibe.com
Mike runs a building maintenance company and his wife Meg is a consultant at the Northern General. Alongside Meg’s mother Dorothy they have combined to create a oneof-a-kind house with vision, passion and an eye for detail that truly makes it stand alone. “We wanted to create a home that was selfsustaining and energy-efficient, focusing on future-proofing. We are quite passionate about our impact on the environment. We wanted somewhere we could live our lives as green as possible,” said Meg. “The wonderful thing about Sheffield is that you have the fingers of green that feed into the city, which made it a great place for
the build.” Before settling on the former sports club, they considered other sites including Grenoside Primary School, The Old Chapel at Middlewood Hospital, Claremont House, Loxley and Brantwood School, Nether Edge but after much deliberation, feasibility studies and costing, finally settled on Pinegrove. “We hadn’t even considered Pinegrove until a chance drive past after visiting the Robin Hood pub in Little Matlock. The site caught our eye, so of course we went to investigate, and ideas just starting pouring out of us. But then the difficult task came of trying to find out who owned it,” said Mike.