CHURCHES CONSERVATION TRUST: |
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A report on the day's events, with images showing some features of the restoration, will appear on the "Restoration" page.
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19 October 2024 |
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7 September 2022"I am Marie Sellars, one of the Heritage Learning Officers at the Churches Conservation Trust (CCT). The CCT is the national charity saving historic churches at risk and St Torney’s Church, North Hill has recently come into our care. "My role is to develop and design the new interpretation for St Torney’s, this is the information future visitors will see, read, experience, when they visit the church. I am keen to hear ideas, thoughts, any memories and stories you would like to share to help future visitors understand why St Torney’s Church and this part of Cornwall is unique and special." |
3 July 2024 Comments from long term North Hill residents having attended the Open Day "It seems bigger and brighter as a result of the walls being plastered. They are on course for an October opening. The monuments have been removed from the walls and reinstalled using stainless steel with a gap behind. Remains of a possible rood screen were found as repairs to the roof and there may have been a lady Chapel on the left. There was talk of items being reclaimed from Lewannick. Water and drainage are being put in at the base of the tower but putting a toilet in would be at the expense of the community." "I went to the church today ... everyone seemed pleased with what was said. Couldn’t see much because we were corralled in quite a small space by the font but it’s all looking very clean and no sign of damp. There were quite a lot of people there which is encouraging ... it does seem there’s been a tremendous amount of work been done."
Click images to enlarge
Images courtesy of Gill Naylor
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27 Jun 2024 E-MAIL FROM CHURCHES CONSERVATION TRUST from Marie Leverett. Dear St Torney Supporters, I’m looking forward to seeing some of you at the community drop in on Weds 3rd July 11:30-13:00 where myself, Marie Sellars and James Routledge will be available to chat with you about current works and future plans for St Torney’s. Please be mindful that the church is currently undergoing repairs internally and there is dust on the pews, site materials on the floor and scaffolding erected around the edges of the nave. The contractor has kindly organised access to the south porch and entrance area so that you can see what work is being undertaken in the church. If you are not comfortable entering the church whilst it is a working building site, one of the team will happily come out and chat to you. If lots of people arrive at once we may have to stagger visits into the entrance area. Please don’t arrive before 11:30 so we can make sure your visit is accompanied by CCT staff. We look forward to seeing you next week and showing you what work is currently taking place in the church.. I look forward to seeing you all soon. All the best, Marie [meleverett@thecct.org.uk] |
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10 May 2024 E-MAIL FROM CHURCHES CONSERVATION TRUST from Marie Leverett. Dear St Torney Supporters, I wanted to update you that the date of the opening celebration at St Torney’s will be Saturday 19th October. We hope that the church interior will be finished by then, (although new conservation/maintenance surprises still keep happening to keep us on our toes!). We look forward to this date as the official re-opening to the public and will have it ready for you to visit and enjoy. Ideas for the event so far seem to be a service of thanks for repairs to the church (Harvest Festival theme) in the morning followed by a buffet lunch with maybe an exhibition by the local art group. I think it might be nice to extend the celebrations into the afternoon, or even the evening though. It’s at this point that all of your ideas are still welcomed and we can carry on chatting over the next few weeks. One suggestion last week was to ask a choir or to invite local musicians to play – let me know any thoughts on this soon as a choir would probably need to be booked asap. I am also keen for the opening event not to be the end, but to be the beginning of lovely things happening at St Torneys, so if anyone has ideas for the months after October I’d love to hear about those too. More dates for your diary: There will be a gathering of people interested in supporting St Torney’s once it re-opens on Saturday 8th June at 7pm at The Old School Inn, North Hill. This meet-up has been organised by people locally but I aim to go along to say hello and try to answer any questions you have. Weds 3rd July 11.30-1pm: Community Drop in at St Torney’s with myself, Meriel O’Dowd and Marie Sellars. I look forward to seeing you all soon. All the best, Marie [meleverett@thecct.org.uk] |
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5 March 2024 E-MAIL FROM CHURCHES CONSERVATION TRUST from Marie Leverett. Dear St Torney Supporters, Attached is a PDF bulletin I have put together to give you a few updates relevant to St Torney. Firstly thanks to those of you who came out to a gathering at The Old School Inn in January – it was great to see so many people there. Hold the date for another Community Drop in session on July 4th 2024 11.30am-1pm. There’s also updates on the interpretation planning and news from the conservation team. I hope you enjoy reading it. |
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9 January 2024 E-MAIL FROM CHURCHES CONSERVATION TRUST from Marie Leverett. Dear St Torney Supporters, As many of you are aware Marie Sellars has been busy gathering ideas and thoughts about what you would like at St Toney’s Church to help visitors to discover more about this important historic building and North Hill. North Hill and St Torney’s Church is so interesting, special and unique - we know it is and we want others to know too! So are keen that as many people as possible share their thoughts/feelings at this consultation. With that in mind, here are six questions for you to answer - Add as much or as little information, with the deadline of Thursday 24th January. Please send to our North Hill email address: northhill@thecct.org.uk. Thank you! The most common theme from our previous consultations, either at events at St Torney’s Church or as part of the online survey, has been History, but with no specification of what, when and who. Is there a particular period, event or historical figure with links to the church or its community that you would like people to know more about? After this, the next steps will include Marie Sellars gathering your responses, then using them to help write a detailed Interpretation Plan that reflects them. This plan includes: Objectives - Why are we doing it? Themes, topic and what we are proposing will be at St Torney’s Church for visitors to explore more about the church, its community the area and/or its many rich stories. The deadline for responses, including ideas, themes and topics is Thursday 24th January - please send to our North Hill email address: northhill@thecct.org.uk. |
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17 November 2023 E-MAIL FROM CHURCHES CONSERVATION TRUST from Marie Leverett. Dear St Torney Supporters, Attached is a PDF bulletin I have put together to give you a few updates relevant to North Hill St Torney. Firstly we still need your feedback on what interpretation will be created at St Torney (deadline 30th Nov), there is information about a meeting in January for people who would like to have future involvement at St Torney’s once it opens and also a short update on conservation. There is also some information on how you can support St Torney’s and the CCT this Christmas. |
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24 October 2023 E-MAIL FROM CHURCHES CONSERVATION TRUST from Marie Leverett. Dear St Torney Supporters, It would be good to know if you would like to have future involvement with the CCT as a volunteer, supporter or with ideas/occasional help at St Torney’s, North Hill. That way, once the church re-opens, we have a plan in place for how your community would like to use the church and help us care for and raise funds for it going forwards. You have contributed some great ideas already (see attached file which I’ve added more ideas to recently) which we could think about more when we meet.I’d like to try and get a date in the diary for January for a meeting with potential supporters, so it would be really useful to know how many of you would like to come along and also whether a weekday, evening or weekend would be best. This would give me a feel for the best date to arrange the meeting for and also how many of us will potentially be at the meeting (so where to have it). If you could reply to let me know if you’d like to come along and also give an indication of availability (weekday, evening or weekend), that would be really helpful. |
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18 September 2023 Community Open Day (9 September 2023) and Conservation Video Dear St Torney Supporters, It was lovely to meet so many of you at our community open day on the 9th September and to see some familiar faces again. I said to people that I would share the new video we were showing on the day about the vesting work we have been carrying out at St Torney. Here it is: |
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27 July 2023 Community Open Day Dear St Torney Supporters, Attached is our poster containing more info about the Heritage Open Days event at St Torney’s on the 9th September. Please feel free to pass onto anyone you think would like to come along. Hope to see you there. All the best, Marie |
8 July 2023 Comment on Facebook from long term North Hill resident regarding the painting of the Spoure Memorial
I was a member of the PCC at the time and remember that we were assured that the colours were as they would have been when the memorial was erected. The gentleman who did the restoration (not sure of date but would be some time in the 1980's I think) was, we were told possibly the last expert qualified to do it, although he did have a young man who was with him and probably his apprentice at the time. Surely this information would be in the minutes of PCC meetings of that time, also correspondence which would have been the responsibilty of the Secretary of that time. My memory is not as reliable as it was, but I clearly remember that it was not a quick botched job, but something that was researched and studied a great deal before work was started. Sorry that I couldn't remember who was the Secretary at the time, but may not be in the vicinity of North Hill or even alive now. Surely Church Records must be available. Barbara Bloomfield
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7 July 2023 E-mail from Marie Leverett of the CTT Dear St Torney Supporters, It was lovely to meet some of the North Hill community last Friday. I’ve written up some of the ideas people had and attached as a PDF bulletin for you to look through. I’ve also included some information about the Community Supporter Gathering I’m organising in Exeter on July 28th, and have attached a leaflet as well. It would be great to have a few people from North Hill there so let me know asap if you’d like to come. Please feel free to pass this onto anyone who you think would be interested in hearing about St Torney’s. All the best, Marie |
30 June 2023 Drop in session to meet CCT representatives |
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24 March 2023 Poster from the CCT in the church porch |
8 December 2022 Scaffolding on the church tower is now shrouded. |
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29 November 2022 Scaffolding being erected on the church tower. |
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19 November 2022 First published in the Autumn 2022 Cornish Buildings Group newsletter, Helen Wilson introduces us to the works of the Sedding family who were instrumental in the design of the chancel that we see today. She writes "Although the 1868 restoration that revealed the extensive C14 work in the chancel was remarkable, the revelation that the work was carried out by Edmund Sedding is truly extraordinary. No-one has hitherto discovered the true identity of the architect of that important restoration. Added to that, the fact that the chancel ceiling was painted by John Dando Sedding, who went on to become a famous Arts & Crafts architect in London, makes this restoration of national significance." Click on the link above to access the newsletter to read more. |
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11 November 2022 Scaffolding being erected on the church tower. |
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20 October 2022 "We can share links to the Church Plans when published and also follow the same approach with the quarterly bulletins." |
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2 October 2022 In answer to these questions - "CCT are going to restore the [Rodd plaque] memorial. They are also going to do a proper job on the big one and the slate tomb. Hopefully within 18 months. |
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22 September 2022 "Thank you for taking the time to come down to the church and making me feel very welcome last week ... I am sharing a document that explains what happens when a church comes into the care of the CCT, who the CCT are, Church Plans and ideas of how to use and support the church.
"Currently, we are in the process of recruiting a new Local Community Officer. St Torney’s will be part of their remit and they will lead on the Church Plan process. They will also be the main contact for St Torney’s at the CCT and will be able to provide an update on the conservation works. Once the LCO is in post, I will pass on your contact email to them, please do let me know it you don’t want me to. "In the meantime, I am looking forward to my return visit, when I will be gathering more ideas and stories for the interpretation. Also, if you have any further ideas in regards to information or suggestions for the signage to be displayed outside during the conservation work, please do let me know. "Marie ... msellars@thecct.org.uk" |
14 September 2022 - notes by NHLHG "This was quite well attended given that hardly anyone seemed to know about it ...The gist is that for the first year there’ll be scaffolding round the tower and the building will have to be dried out. This means, I think, that for the duration of the scaffolding and any remedial work inside the church won’t be accessible to the public though there was mention of possible tours at some point. "Second year - they plan to change the paint on the Spoure monument because the current covering is modern product. They’re also looking at the metalwork on the Vincent memorial. "Future plans could include maybe using the bell tower for holiday accommodation, putting in a loo and identifying a possible kitchen area so the church could be used for concerts, choirs, exhibitions etc. "There seems to be a separation between the fabric of the church and contents which means that maybe some of the artefacts are still in some sort of limbo. ...The Lady Chapel altar has been removed to Lewannick, which few knew about, and the bell ropes seem to have disappeared. There’s also a plaque missing from the wall on the left side of the altar. The bible has gone. Interestingly, the architect said that the bell tower was sound, though they’re checking the bell hanging. Apparently the bells are valuable." Update - the plaque referred to is now stored in a cupboard. 17 September 2022 - from a correspondent
"My own feeling would be to leave well alone, unless it is a conservation issue, as (1) we don't know what the original colours were - can we implicitly trust the Spoure book's illustration as correct?; and (2) the current appearance is evidence of a reworking of the monument at a particular point in time, when such things were common. Who are we to replace it, when in another century the paint might be seen as 'historic' in its own right? Like the Victorians whitewashing wall paintings, or in the mid-20th century getting rid of Victorian colour schemes. "The Vincent monument needs an appraisal by a monument conservator to assess how it is held together and the security of the fixings, and whether and how they need to be replaced. To me, that's the more urgent monumental job." |
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The image at the top of this page shows the CCT logo, St Torney's and a memorial to Vincent Darley. |
Thank you for the notification regarding St Torney's Church. I was puzzled about the remarks about the paint on the Spoure Memorial.
