Church spires in danger from corrosion, rotten timber and … woodpeckers
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Version 0 of 1. The soaring spires of parish churches that punctuate the UK skyline – a pointer to heaven for the devout and a landmark for all – are in trouble: stone is decaying, timbers rotting and the iron cramps added by the Victorians corroding and splitting the stones they were intended to preserve. Some have suffered more exotic damage from woodpeckers, who are gradually destroying many timber clad spires. The cost of the specialist restoration work is also soaring, far beyond the means of many dwindling congregations, and the National Churches Trust, which has already helped restore scores of spires, is launching an appeal to raise at least £250,000 to help more. Many parish churches are now on the Historic England register of listed buildings at risk: storms and torrential rain of recent years have wreaked further damage and without urgent repairs many are judged in danger of collapse. Some have already been fenced off or dismantled because of the risk to the public from falling stone. The parishioners of St Mary de Castro, a beautiful medieval church in Leicester that was once a royal chapel in the castle precinct and where the body of Richard III may have been exposed before his ignominious burial at the nearby Greyfriars, were already fundraising to save their 179-foot spire when it was judged so dangerous that it could collapse completely. The church had to be closed for months, and the money spent instead on dismantling it, leaving only the stump of the tower. They are still determined to rebuild the spire, but the cost is now estimated at £500,000. The stonework of the spire of Christ Church Highbury, a landmark in north London since 1848, is now so fragile that the church is partly fenced off: a notice explains “these railings have been put here to protect the public as the spire is feeling its age”. The churches falling victim to woodpecker assaults include the George Gilbert Scott-designed St Mary the Virgin at Flaxley in Gloucestershire, where the birds have removed so many shingles that they are able to nest inside the spire, and St Michael and All Angels at Knighton-upon-Teme in Worcestershire, a 12th-century church whose spire was clad in cedar shingles in the 1950s, but where the birds have pecked inch-wide holes allowing water to pour into the church below. Diana Evans, head of the places of worship advisory section of Historic England, says: “Local congregations try to keep their spires in good condition but many simply don’t have enough money to keep their spires up.” |