Shropshire Star

Glamping and wedding site near Oswestry spruced up and ready for guests

Cinemas, art galleries and other companies across Shropshire had been waiting with bated breath ahead of the Prime Minister’s announcement yesterday.

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Katrina and Steve Boydon from Barnutopia, near Oswestry

One business that is looking forward to reopening is Barnutopia glamping and wedding venue in Llansilin, west of Oswestry.

Having closed their canopy doors on March 23, owners Katrina and Steve Boydon have since been taking on the care and maintenance work of their four furloughed staff, making repairs and repainting

The couple, who featured on ITV’s entrepreneurial show Give It a Year in 2018, have also had to implement extra precautions to ensure communal areas are as safe as possible.

Katrina said: “There’s not an awful lot we can do differently, as if you clean and launder everything properly in the first place, you shouldn’t need to take many more precautions.

“But we’ve been preparing guidelines stating what we’ve already done and we’ll be giving suggestions to guests on how to socially distance and stay safe.”

With uncertainty having surrounded the official reopening date, Katrina and Steve have been aiming to honour a booking on July 23.

Katrina added: “We’ve been manically postponing and rescheduling weddings and events.

“Everything has been postponed until July 23 for a wedding and we are all hopeful this will go ahead.

“It’s been a very strange few months. We’re normally incredibly busy throughout April and in mid-March a running group came and had a gathering.

“The following weekend we were due to have a horse tack sale which was postponed until November, after that an American group were meant to be coming but that had to be rescheduled too.”