Historic England Heritage Stimulus Fund
Historic England Heritage Stimulus Fund Project: West Transept Project
The Church of St John the Baptist, Rochdale, has been awarded a grant from the Heritage Stimulus Fund, administered by Historic England as part of the wider Culture Recovery Fund. The grant of £182,442 will support essential works to the West Transept of the church – this is where we enter the church and includes the choir loft. The work includes the re-covering of roofs, rebuilding of parapets, repointing brickwork and internal plaster repairs and redecorating.
The West Transept has had a long history of water ingress through the structure of the building resulting from fundamental weaknesses in the original design. This has led to damage to internal finishes and the loss of large areas of internal wall plaster as well as damage to the external brickwork. The repair scheme aims to make these parts of the building properly weather-tight in order to slow down the rate of deterioration of the concrete structure, and allow the interior surfaces to be restored and decorated.
The project is being overseen by the Diocese of Salford and the church architect Chloe Granger of Crosby Granger Architects. We look forward to seeing work commencing in November 2021 when the scaffolding should start to go up; the majority of the work will be completed by Easter 2022. It was possible to apply for this grant funding to repair the west end of the church because we now have detailed plans of the whole church as part of our application for National Lottery Heritage Fund to repair other areas of the church including the dome and the mosaic.
St John’s is the only church in the diocese to receive funding through this heritage grant.
More details can be found here:
https://www.dioceseofsalford.org.uk/heritage-funding-offers-new-lease-of-life-for-landmark-church/
Heritage Stimulus Fund - Progress Meeting 24 March 2022
Today’s meeting was the final progress meeting as the project is nearing completion. The good weather in recent days has enabled the builders to do some catching up on time lost to rain and storms. The pre-meeting inspection was of particular interest to me as I went up on the scaffold with the architect’s team and the builders: the world looks somewhat different when you are within touching distance of the church dome!
From ground level I hadn’t realised the church had so many flat roofs. These have now been replaced and made watertight. There is also lots of insulation to keep in the heat. The brickwork at the front of the building has been pointed and cleaned so should look good when the scaffolding is taken down in early April.
Internally work in the loft area is progressing well. This was a neglected area of the church but is being brought back to life by this project. The windows and surrounds have been thoroughly cleaned and several small panes of glass have been replaced. The damaged door surround has been repaired and where there was considerable plaster damage to walls these areas have been completely re-plastered. The internal painting will be completed in the next few day but a word of warning is needed here. The walls and ceiling in the loft area are so wet that moisture is leaching through the paintwork while the building drys out. It is intended that these areas will need another coat of paint once the brickwork has dried out over the summer. A special lime based paint has been used for the decoration: the trade name for the paint is St John!
It is intended that all the work on the Heritage Stimulus Fund project will be completed by Wednesday 13 April. There is lots to do in these final few weeks but every expectation that the builders will keep to timetable.
The meeting concluded with thanks to the team for a successful project and thanks to parishioners for being so understanding while the work progresses.
John McNerney