Day 140 - Staining the Roof Trusses

Week 29 - Day 140
Having finished the messy work applying lime plaster to the ceiling laths attention has now turned to the roof trusses.
Before work started the trusses had been boxed in by lath and plaster and painted white to match the walls and ceiling. The pews are going to be painted an pale white/cream tones, so it has been decided to  leave the trusses as bare wood but with a cleaned up surface.
The cleaning has removed a white coating which indicated where the original ceiling had been constructed.

Here the uncleaned roof trusses of George Street Chapel show the bare wood which would have
been within the attic space. The white paint would have been visible below the original ceiling.

The George Street Chapel  roof trusses were covered with lath and plaster
and painted white when the original ceiling was removed and the roof lights inserted.
This how the roof trusses were found when the conservation repairs started.  

Day 139 - Plastering around Skylights -2

Week 29 - Day 139
Having completed the laths, the plastering actually started to day.

Day 138 - Plastering Around Skylights

Week 29 - Day 138
The final works around the ceiling is the complete the plastering.

Day 137 - Fitting New Door Frames

Week 29 - Day 137
New door frames added to the new door openings to the new toilets.
For everyones convenience.

Day 136 - New Window Painted

Week 28 - Day 136
One of the large chapel windows was too rotten to be saved. These are all replacement windows inserted in the 1990's by the last owner. sadly the original ones with the hopper window openings were not saved, and not reproduced either. A complete re-make of all the windows to the original design was sadly too expensive an option, so the windows have been cleaned, repaired and repainted but one was too poorly preserved and a new one has been made.

New window replacing one of the ones removed. 

Replaced windows in the basement having been cleaned and renovated. 

Day 135 - Plastering Works Start in the Old Vestry / New Kitchen

Week 28 - Day 135
The former vestry spaces have started to be converted into their new uses as kitchen and washing -up areas.

Day 134 - Other Cellars in George Street

Week 28 - Day 134
Spent this afternoon looking at the cellars of the buildings up the hill, north, of the chapel.
Aa with the chapel almost no original features remain, no fireplaces or plaster and many have lost their appearance of being a room because the floors of the shops above have been lowered so that they are now flush with the pavement of George Street.
One of the premises has retained some fitments which we hope to replicate in the chapel cellar, though not the nice stone steps. To the side of the, now empty fireplace, is a built in cupboard with four doors and a stone sink on the other side of the fireplace. A board partition is still in place between the window and the access door from Jackson Pit. As with the cellar dwellings at the chapel the access from Jackson Pit is at street level, not a true cellar, though th e windows on the George Street elevation are below the level of the street.

Stone steps down to the basement.

Green paint to the built in cupboard door.

The back of the cupboard is un-plastered brickwork. 

A board partition between the window (now bricked up) and the door
to Jackson Pit.