The Spire at St Mary's

Visit to Spire by AA Conservation Students on 13th March 2015

Project Architect Fergus Mc Cormick of Thomas Ford & Partners led a group of four AA conservation students on an inspection of the Spire on 13th March 2015. Andrew Kennedy of contractors PAYE was also in attendance. The students were shown the recent opening up works carried out on the Spire as part of the development stage of the Heritage Lottery Fund Grant for the Spire Repair Project. This visit by conservation students is one of a range of activities being organised as part of the Heritage Lottery Funded grant for the Spire Repair works. The visit was very successful and the students enjoyed the inspection and learned a lot about the proposed repairs.

Visit to Spire by SPAB (Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings) Scholars and Fellows on 17th March 2015.

Project Architect Fergus Mc Cormick of Thomas Ford & Partners led a group of 8 SPAB scholars and fellows on an inspection of the Spire on 17thMarch 2015 (see photos attached). Alex Towle and Master Mason Bert from PAYE were in attendance to impart their expertise on the repair of the ragstone Spire to the SPAB visitors. Mr Ian Harper, English Heritage Buildings at Risk Officer, was also in attendance to brief the visitors on the Heritage Lottery Funded grant process. Justin Mc Ateer of Engineers Hockley & Dawson was also on site to brief the visitors on the structural repair proposals. The visit included an internal and external inspection of the tower from the scaffold. The SPAB visitors enjoyed their visit and learned a lot about the proposed repairs to the Rag stone, York stone and Bath stone found on the Spire and the proposed structural repair works.

Update on Progress with Heritage Lottery Funded Repair Works to Spire

The first stage of the grant aided works on site are now complete. These consisted of the erection of the scaffold, opening up works and the inspections and reports by the Design Team. Thomas Ford & Partners issued the second round submission to the Heritage Lottery Fund in December 2014. The Church is currently awaiting confirmation of the second round repair grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund before appointing the contractor PAYE to carry out the repair contract works to the Spire. It is hoped that the Spire Repair works contract will start on site at the end of April / beginning of May 2015 and will be completed by November 2015.

You can support our Spire Fund if you buy online

Do you shop on line? You can support our Spire Fund if you buy online from Amazon, Argos, John Lewis, Tesco or any of 2700 retailers. Go to this website first:

www.easyfundraising.org.uk/causes/stmarysspire Then click on the retailers you want and they will give us a percentage of your shop value. Many thanks to everyone who is already using this.