The Craufurd Arms was originally a semi-temperance Hotel built as a People's Refreshment House. The idea behind this was to provide a pleasant environment suitable for families and the manager received profits from soft drinks and tea & coffee but did not from alcohol sales. It was named after the co-founder of these hotels who icidentally was also behind the NAAFI movement. The building boasts all the original features including rather unusual patented sash windows.

This improvement scheme concentrates solely on refurbishment and improvements to the signage. The first job to be undertaken was the regilding of the self mounted lettering on the front of the building.

One of the more interesting aspects of this scheme was the decision to re-instate the original wall sign, painted directly high up on the end gabled wall. There had been painted boards obscuring the wall painting, but one of the boards had fallen off to reveal the painting underneath. There was a simple "Charrington" sign revealed when the boards were removed - but the decision was made to reinstate the more interesting earlier sign which features on old photos of the area. Colin, the Signwriter, took a paint sample from "the sign under the sign under the sign" and specially colour matched this. The old photo was copied exactly and this sign has put some real character back into the local street-scape.

The inn sign is currently being copied as the board is beyond restoration so a new sign is needed. This will include gold leaf work. The next stage will involve restoring the lettering together with gold-leaf gilding of the details of the distinctive pressed tin sign high up on the front of the building.

Apart from the improvement grant the owner, John Caplin has also invested considerable additional funding towards these signage improvements.

Sign Writing & Wall Sign: Colin Dundas

Gold leaf work: Dean Box