Another week goes by on the construction site and once again the amount of progress offers such a variety of choice to a blogger (yes after all these blogs I have decided to drop the “novice” caveat) it is difficult to know where to start. In this blog I am going to look at what is happening to the interior of the existing buildings but first a quick “blogging gallop” around the outside. Despite the slightly inclement weather, we have reached some significant milestones. The narthex entrances on both the Old Church and the Withduck sides of the building have doors! Yes, real doors you can open and walk through, of course it is true that on the Old Church side you could just as easily walk through the spaces where the store front glass will go but even that will soon be installed. The other big milestone, at least for me, is the installation of the little semi-circulars of glass that top off the palladium windows, each glass now surrounded by an arch of Flemish Bond pattern brickwork (if you’re wondering what that is please cast you eye over the previous blog), it really is most pleasing to the eye but now let’s cut to the chase and take a look inside. You may recall the plan to refurbish what I call the “Office Corridor,” that part of the existing building where our Clergy, accountants, the Parish Administrator and the Duty Angel have their respective offices. Some while ago Father Bob and Mother Ashley vacated their offices and Gretchen Hood decamped down the corridor to share that little room where I was a part time occupant. Well now Gretchen and your correspondent have moved out of the corridor to take up temporary residence in Tucker Hall. Father Bob is continuing as the “Rector-Of-No-Fixed-Office,” Mother Ashely is operating from her home and as soon as possible the accounting office will also decamp to Tucker to leave the corridor without occupants. Once fully vacated the refurbishment can begin with removal of the furniture, kit and caboodle all to be stored in Tucker, then the floors will be stripped, walls painted, and new carpet laid. When I’m not playing at building project manager I like to tinker with an old sports car and it being British it has an endearing, and at times very frustrating, selection of Whitworth, Imperial and Metric sized nuts and bolts and you can guarantee I never pick up the right spanner* to work on the car. Imagine that little confusion multiplied a thousand times, and you will get an idea of what Scott Crumley encounters many times everyday as he wrestles with the challenge of integrating the new buildings with the old. I’ve blogged about some of those challenges before, there was the roof with its different heights, the odd angles, joining flat areas to pitched roofing and then there was the electrical system to say nothing of the sewers and drains. This week the focus has been on starting to connect the Narthex to the passage outside Tucker Hall and the rear wing to what was the back of the existing building (where the door leading out to Alfriend House used to be) all bring new problems for Scott to solve. Remember the set of double doors you needed a generous soul to hold open if you ever had the misfortune of trying to enter the building when your arms were full? Those doors are no more, removed this very day by the small husband and wife demo team who, when I left the site, had moved on to taking out the little vestibule enclosed by those doors so construction can begin to make the ceilings level, fill the voids* between the walls (get me, tossing around building terminology like I know what I’m talking about), and integrate the floors all necessary to seamlessly connect the old and the new. Remember the old library where meetings used to be held and every week counters used to do their counting. The old library is no more and that little passage with its sloping floor to the back door is gone. The old library wall where the bookcases and cupboards stood has been demolished and now you can cross into the back wing, albeit whilst navigating around trip hazards and, at least today, another one of Scott’s demo-teams. This “knock through” is no simple task, if you remove about eight feet of supporting wall without due caution there is a good chance some of the new roof will join you and become even more of a trip hazard, although that would probably be the least of your woes. So, like pit-props in a mine, the demo team has set in place wooden props to support the roof until a new weight bearing steel beam is installed to take up the weighty burden. Way back in the very beginning of the rear wing’s construction the bricklayers built a fire wall outside the library, it stands about a foot off from the existing brick wall. This construction has left a void (there I go again) and walking from the existing building, through the recent demolition and into the rear wing you can still see that void and even look up into the new roofing frames. Glancing to the right as you pass the void you can see one of the scupper’s down pipes, that used to carry away rainwater from the old flat roof, still attached to the brick wall. The void will be closed off when the new corridor is completed and I was struck by the thought that maybe one day, far off in the future, a group of parishioners might have cause to open the void for their own new building project and there they will find that old down pipe and scupper standing as a testament to the work we have undertaken. Perhaps a testament of great interest to a future Historic Traditions commission? I’d like to think so. Stay safe and stay healthy, David Beach. “Spanner” Brit speak for a wrench. “Void” Not Brit speak this time, these voids are small gaps or spaces in the walls that are sealed off in the final construction.
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AuthorDavid Beach is our Building Project Manager, and has been an active part of our parish family for more than a decade. He is retired from NATO and the British Army and is a joy and blessing to all of us. Archives
July 2021
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