It may seem as if everything has gone quiet since we last gave you an update on our HLF project. But lots has been happening – it’s just it’s been like that swan sailing serenely over the water but paddling hard underneath. So what has been going on?
- Repairs: the various experts submitted all their reports which meant that our architect could draw up a specification setting out exactly what needs to be done. Once he’d done that, we could apply for the necessary permissions to do the work and we now have our faculty. The Historic England and HLF officers also approved the work. Then it was out to tender to see the final costs. The experts had identified that there were more repairs needed than we knew – particularly in regard to the tower. So it has not been a total surprise to receive figures that are way higher than anticipated. This means that we can’t do everything we had hoped. We will do the repair work as it is vital the building is safe and ‘mended’ pus make the front of church more wheelchair user friendly. However the servery at the back of church will need to be looked at as a separate project now.
- Activities: as part of the project, we will be running activities to open up the building to more people – to introduce it to more visitors, to hold tours and workshops and more. So there’s been a lot of researching into history and we have worked out the way ahead on this front. But it’s been a lot of work drawing up our proposals.
- Grants: we are researching more grant –making bodies to see if we can close the funding gap
- Phase 2 of the project: once we have the final costs in from our architect and contractors, we will make our submission to HLF for permission to go ahead with the actual work of repair.
- Prayer: that this will all come together and this hidden gem at the heart of Measham will be more and more open to those who live here and those who visit from further afield