Archive Post 6: Tower, St. Cross, Winchester.

Following on from the project in early October at St. Cross I worked there on the painting of the tower interior for McNeilage Conservation. They had begun with a smaller team cleaning and conserving the inside and I joined them to paint the stone walls following this.

The top lift of the scaffold inside the tower

The wonderful painted ceiling was conserved prior to my arrival and I worked with the team painting an oil based distemper on the walls, arches and walkways below.

The bottom lift of the three large scaffold floors.

The oil based distemper was used as lime wash would not adhere to the layers of previous paint. On most areas two or more coats were used to provide good coverage over the stones which were more porous. Repairs were also carried out on a vaulted ceiling over the south transept.

The church during the project.

Both this project and the one highlighted last week were part of a large conservation project at the hospital, England's oldest charitable institution.

Next Friday will highlight the second project at Tewkesbury Abbey I took part in.

Archive Post 5: Renaissance Stalls, St. Cross, Winchester.

In October I was employed by Madeleine Katkov to work on a very unusual oak pair of benches with early Renaissance carved panels, possibly the first to enter Britain. They reside in an almshouse, The Hospital of St. Cross.

One of the main panels during conservation.

As a contrast to most of the work I carried out in 2013 this was a piece of wooden furniture, though on a large scale. Most of the cleaning was carried out with gentle swab cleaning using ammonia water.

A panel during cleaning.

The projects was carried out by Madeleine and myself along with a few members of the local community who quickly developed the skills and attitudes required for such a delicate conservation project.

Paint uncovering on one of the pendants.

In addition to the cleaning there were some paint layers on the carvings which were uncovered with chemical and gentle mechanical methods. 

Next Friday's post will discuss some more work at St. Cross, this time up in the tower. 

Down tools!

I hope you're enjoying the archive posts, still three more to go. Here's a very quick post about what I'm up to at the moment. I'm currently working on a project in Dartmouth on the painted ceiling at St. Saviours Church.

St. Saviours, Dartmouth. 

I worked there last week but annoyingly the weather has intervened and I've had to pause for the time being due to the loss of train and road links between Devon and the North. So until the 24th I'm working on other projects at home.

The destroyed line on my route.

Once I'm back I'll take plenty of photos of the work and post them here. The project's really exciting, and has already thrown up some new discoveries.

On Friday there will be another archive post, this time of the wonderful Renaissance panels at St. Cross in Winchester.

Archive Post 4: Tewkesbury Abbey, Tewkesbury.

In the longest project I've taken part in so far I worked from March to September 2013 with Cliveden Conservation at the beautiful Norman Tewkesbury Abbey. Working on the external stone we conserved through pinning fire damaged stones, re-pointing, rendering, tile repairs and cement removal.

The conserved side of the abbey after the project.

Excluding the tower and the east-end, all of the walls on the south side of the abbey were fully conserved. The project was a huge undertaking and required a great deal of preparation and ongoing planning to ensure the lime related work was performed efficiently.

The lengthy triforium platform. 

The access to the triforium was provided by a suspended scaffold platform and mortar repairs on this lift required very regular tending over the exceptionally hot summer of 2013. The abbey has had a very controversial history of conservation, inspiring William Morris to found the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings (SPAB) following the highly destructive restoration of the late C19th. Now the conservation is much more sensitive and ethical.

Tile repairs to the west end of the south wall.

Some previous restorers had used local sandstone to replace damaged stones. These stones are incompatible with the limestone of the building and had mostly turned to sand and been lost. To rectify this we used limestone coloured tiles and lime putty to build up lost areas of stone and return the shape of the original stone while still retaining the honesty of a visual repair.

Next Friday's archive will be on renaissance panels at St. Cross in Winchester.

Archive Post 3: Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford.

In February 2013 I was part of a team preparing Christ Church Cathedral in Oxford for the Maundy Thursday visit by the Queen, broadcast worldwide by the BBC. The project, ran by Cliveden Conservation, composed of repairs to the stone, cleaning and lime washing.

The marble floor after conservation.

A major aspect of the work was the cleaning, waxing and polishing of the Victorian marble floor. This included the careful cleaning of the monument to Edward Bouverie Pusey (bottom left of above photo) which I carried out towards the end of the project. 

Monuments during cleaning from a mobile scaffold tower.

Work around the entrance of the cathedral included vacuum cleaning the ornate wooden ceiling, monument cleaning and cleaning and lime washing two large walls either side of the west door. Much of this work was carried out by myself at height using a movable aluminium scaffold. 

One of the two west walls following conservation.

Many of the fine Norman columns were also cleaned where grease and dirt had built up over many years. The Church remained open throughout the project, and is extremely popular with tourists who on the whole seemed to really enjoy observing conservation up close. 

Next Friday the archive post will be about Tewkesbury Abbey.