MAGENTA BUILDING CONSERVATION LTD
Stonemasonry, restoration and complete repair works to historical and ecclesiastical buildings.
Lancing College Chapel, Sussex
One of Magenta Building Conservation Limited's largest conservation masonry contracts was Lancing Collage Chapel. Work included stonework, conservation repair, cast iron ferramenta repairs and glazing repairs. The majority of the work was to the apse and east end. Some leadwork was carried out to the roof on the east end and to circular windows at the west end. The work was overseen by Michael Dury Architects of Salisbury and the client was The Friends of Lancing College Chapel.
The majority of the work was stone replacement. The local stone that the chapel was originally built from was a poor weathering Sussex sandstone. The use of sandstone is quite unusual in the south of England as the majority of building sandstones are north of an approximate line between Bristol and Lincoln, English Heritage gave us permission to use Blaxter, a northern sandstone which matched geologically and aesthetically. However on the more sensitive areas, like around the windows etc, we needed to find a source of some of the original local stone. Unfortunately all the local quarries for the supply of this stone had closed, so Magenta obtained temporary permission to extract stone from an old disused quarry near Burgess Hill, which was now a private garden. We managed to extract some large blocks that had been left when the quarry had closed forty years previously. These were taken to Wiltshire for primary sawing, then on to our workshop for working into the dimensioned stones as required. Most of this stone was used for major repairs to the tracery, jambs and mullions of the large southern windows. The southern windows on close inspection were found to be in a less stable condition than anticipated, one of which needed immediate shoring up before further repair works could be carried out. This is where our engineering department was able to assist our masons in the immediate production of some mullion support brackets, designed on site and produced in our workshop to provide support to the remains of window whilst still leaving a means of access for work by the masons.
There were also two large circular windows that were in a very poor state of repair. A lot of stone was missing especially cusps and foils. A lot of the remaining stone was only held in place by the glass and lead caime, to retain as much of the original window and replace the missing elements proved to be very difficult conservation masonry repair. Much of the existing masonry had to be consolidated and stainless steel pinned together. Accurate sections of the missing elements were produced using existing remains and masonry geometry. We then produced the masonry on the banker, this was then fixed and pinned to the existing masonry much of which relying on stainless steel dowels and rods. Once the glass was repaired and reaffixed our conservators worked over the whole window inside and out to complete the repair.
The whole of the apse end was repointed. This represented twenty two lifts of scaffold at two metres a lift plus scaffolding to the pinnacles and the spirolet; it was a huge area. We also carried out conservation repairs to many deep cracked ashlar and quoin stones by fine pointing and micro grouting. Stainless steel stitch repairs were carried out using spiro ties and resin by drilling across the cracked ashlars in the buttresses. As well as repair and repointing to the spirolet complete replacement of octagonal apex stone below the finial at the top of the structure was carried out.
Internally stone repairs were carried out to the ribbed vaulting above the windows which needed pinning and consolidating. A lot of glass was replaced in windows throughout the chapel.
Repairs were needed to the large decorative cast iron ferramenta on the outside of all the windows. The spec was to remove the rusting ferramenta, which was expanding and destroying the stonework around it. We removed it carefully and took it back to our workshop. It had originally been thought that it was wrought iron, but on inspection we discovered that it was cast iron, therefore we had to devise a reliable technique for welding this particularly poor quality / unusual quality cast iron to stainless steel. After some research we found the right rods and temperatures to complete the job .We stainless tipped hundreds of ferramenta ends. The design was also changed slightly to make any future maintenance easier.
Although on this particular contract, at the end of the defects liability, there were no defects, using natural materials lime mortar etc it would not be unreasonable to expect one or two minor failures, with the prohibitive cost of
re-scaffolding often these items remain undone or redone at great expense to the contractor, this can result in litigation, bad feeling etc. Magenta does not have these problems as we provide a full rope access repair and survey service, we offer this service to our competitors as well as generally. See techniques.
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Magenta Building Conservation Ltd - Unit D, Milton Mills, Milton Abbas, Blandford, Dorset. DT11 0BQ