I LIKE to think of myself as a lateral thinker, you know a bit creative; writing, drawing, designing, constructing and so on. Due to this artistic bent I sometimes drift into those vacant zones when I couldn’t honestly tell you what was going on in my head. It was during such a moment that, stood in our kitchen and staring at my feet, a whole flood of inspiration came rushing into the space. It wasn’t so much my feet that provoked the thoughts, but what they were stood on… flagstones!

Well maybe I’m not just considering flagstones, but all the stones from which many of the older houses and boundary walls are constructed round here – I’m talking about Cotswold Stone. Although visitors to our region go into raptures about it, we sort of take it for granted don’t we? We’ve got used to it. It’s not really surprising since geologists tell us that Cotswold Stone has been around for 150 million years. Now that has to be quite a long-lasting material! Our region was apparently once under water but due to a massive tectonic upheaval a big chunk of oolitic limestone formed during the Jurassic Period and stretching from the Wash in West Suffolk right down to Portland in Dorset, twisted forming an escarpment on it’s western edge and a gentle slope to the east. We in West Oxfordshire sit on the eastern slopes, on the edge of the area known as the Cotswold Hills. The main part of the escarpment stretches for about sixty miles and can best be seen at Leckhampton Hill and Cleeve Common in Gloucestershire. This limestone has been acknowledged as some of the most beautiful and durable building material in the world.

Many quarries were used to provide the stone throughout the region. In Witney it appears there were quarries to the west of the town and materials were transported up Crundell Street for building projects within the town. This street was later renamed Corn Street. A region that more readily tells the story of quarrying is the area around Kingham and Sarsden, 13 miles northwest of Witney. Kingham had a number of ancient quarries (known as ‘quars’) named after the colour of their stone. There was Red Quar, White Quar and I seem to remember a Blue Quar all producing their own distinctive shade. At the nearby village of Churchill, a magnificent church was built using local stone by James Haughton Langston. Designed by James Plowman of Oxford in 1826 it is a two thirds copy of Magdalen College tower in Oxford.

Churchill has the distinction of being the birthplace of a few notable individuals, Warren Hastings the first Governor-General of British India was born there in 1732, and in 1769 the ‘Father of English Geology’, Willliam Smith came into the world. It was Smith (apparently called ‘Strata’ by his friends) who mapped out the geology of England and provided a wealth of information gained through careful study of rock formations. I seem to recall a story that he was responsible for a serious error in judgment when selecting the stone for building or repairing the church but don’t quote me on this, it’s just a vague memory.

A numbr of years ago whilst working on our old cottage in Kingham I took a moment to explore under the concrete floor with a hammer and chisel, excited at the prospect of a flagstone floor being unearthed, I chiseled away at the concrete and a few hours work rewarded me with a wonderfully ancient stone-paved surface to our sitting room. More than that it bore the marks of its history. During the 17th century the cottage had been a cider mill and its past was intriguingly etched into the flagstones. The wear recorded the path of an incredibly bored donkey who would have been harnessed to a beam on an apple press and taken a circular route round and round a large wooden vat in the centre of the floor.

There is a purpose to the story here and I think I’ve touched on it in this column before. It’s the whole business of respecting our heritage whilst addressing the needs of the day. I began reading a few drafts of Local Plans but was slightly daunted by the sheer volume of them. I came across local plans that covered biodiversity, geodiversity, infrastructure and many other issues. I guess they’re all saying the same sort of thing and echoing my concerns here. Of course we need to build new housing and improve the infrastructure to cope but it demands sensitivity to the underlying elements of the area – not least in the thought that it all used to be under water! In the words of Joni Mitchell in her song, ‘Big Yellow Taxi’, let’s be careful not to “pave paradise and put up a parking lot”.