St Peter's Parish News
Thursday 1 January 1970
The roof repairs have started!
Good news! This week, scaffolding has gone up outside and inside St Peter’s. After years of fundraising, we are now in a position to commence repair work on the leaking church roof!
This is the first phase of repairs, costing £52,000 from the Renovation Appeal fund. Most of the work will be over east slope and North Transept – hopefully this will stop all the leaks of rainwater that have been coming in over the Lady Chapel and the Vestry. We’re hoping that we won’t find too much timber decay, but if that becomes a problem, we have a contingency of £8000 in place. We are working with a company called Maelstrom.
The work will take approximately 17 weeks, due to complete sometime around early May. This is mainly to allow the plasterwork inside the Lady Chapel to dry out slowly. We’ve written to all our immediate neighbours on Castle Street to apologise in advance for any noise or disruption.
How does it affect church access?
The North Transept area is closed for safety – please keep out of this area at all times. Special access will be permitted for designated persons who manage the heating system (hard hats to be worn). Access to the Vestry is via the little door in the St Catherine’s Chapel only. Limited access is permitted to the Lady Chapel from the Vestry for storing equipment.
At the 9:30 Sunday Eucharist, Holy Communion will be distributed from the Chancel step (as we did during COVID). Morning and Evening Prayer will be held in the St Catherine’s Chapel. The rest of the church will remain open during the week as normal for private prayer. You can see detailed access information in the document shown here.
What’s next?
The Renovation Appeal doesn’t finish here. Rainwater is still getting in in other places, threatening historic monuments and the organ, and so St Peter’s Renovation Appeal will continue to raise funds as we plan for future repairs to the roof over the North Transept, the St John Chantry and the St Catherine Chapel.
So far, we’ve raised around £60,000 for the Renovation Appeal with raffles, lasagne evenings, craft fairs, almost £7000 in donations at the Festival of Light, some very generous-lump sum donations, and even more lasagne! So please continue to support St Peter’s in any way you can. If you’d like to make a gift to the Renovation Appeal, you can contact the treasurer in confidence about making a Gift-Aided donation.
