With a church building that dates back to 1305 there are always things that need attention.

The Tower

The tower is a Victorian addition and has some cracks in it. The surveyors think it has been cracked for many years, problems likely to have started not long after it was built. The weight of the roof and the bells  splaying out the walls. 

Work on the Church tower continues as does general maintenance to the Church. Tenders for the work to the tower have now been received from a number of building contractors and we are expecting to award a contract over the next few days. As well as work to the stonework including pointing and strengthening where needed, the roof of the tower will also see new timbers and tile work to ensure that the tower stands for another 130 ears....and hopefully longer!

Our hope is to obtain additional funding from grants but the work to date is being funded from our building repair fund. The main contributors to this fund are the 100 Club members. We are very aware that the work on the tower will stretch our funds and invite you all to consider whether you can afford a donation. We now have donation button on this site.

The Flooring :

The parquet floor in the Church has failed in a few area with the oak tiles either working loose or crumbling with rot. This left a patch at the back of the Church badly in need of repair as it was causing a safety hazard. The parquet floor was laid at the end of the 19th century using oak tile and it has taken some time to be able to locate tiles suitable for the repair work. We are glad to say that we have now managed to do so and the floor has been repaired.

The Roof

Unfortunately, in a recent storm, a ridge tile blew off the top of the Church, above the chancel, meaning that there was a gap, a bit like a missing tooth. As the ridge tile fell down the north side of the Church it broke and dislodged a number of tiles on its way. The only way we could reach such a height to replace it was by hiring a high-lift platform - a cherry picker - which we did in June. We used the opportunity to do some other repair work such as replacing broken tiles and pointing up lime mortar while we had the cherry picker on site. Our last Quinquennial report highlighted a number of things to address at a high level and so the hire of the cherry picker was a great help in addressing these. As well as broken tiles and pointing, we were also able to replace lead flashing, repair stone work and areas around the west window where old mortar had failed. We can report that our excellent treasurer is a dab hand with a cherry picker. Our concern now is that he may run off to become a builder!