The Church of England in St Mary’s, Sixpenny Handley,
Gussage St Andrew and St Rumbold’s, Pentridge.
Gussage St Andrew and St Rumbold’s, Pentridge.
As a church we have both a spiritual responsbility to our community and a practical responsibility to look after the listed buildings we use.
Work to open up the space at the back of the church and lay a new Purbeck stone floor is now complete. The new space was well used during Sixpenny Handley’s Spring Fayre on 29th March. The font can now be moved into its new position in front of the tower, planned for early June.
The toilet and storage cupboards in the base of the tower are finished and looking splendid. This would not have been possible without your financial support and the hard work of many people. Our thanks especially to Graham Dye, our builder and his workmen, and our architect John Turnball.
Thanks to a substantial grant, Phase 2 can now go ahead and will be completed in time for the Spring Fayre. This phase will see a new limestone floor laid across the back of the church to make a new social area and space for the restored font.
Phase 1 of The 50K Challenge building project began in early February 2010. This will see the inside of the tower modified with the installation of a toilet and improved storage facilities. A trench is being dug around the back of the church to link the toilet to the existing drainage at the Vicarage.
To ensure full disabled access to the new toilet, the floor of the tower is being lowered. A smart glass screen will close the tower off, whilst allowing light to flood in from the window at the back of the tower.
The font has already been moved out of the tower to under go restoration before being placed in front of the glass screen in the new welcome area at the back of the church.
Click here to see the latest photos of the building work.
Before we could install the toilet into the tower of the church we had to do something about the weights from the clock which drop down all the way to the floor!
The solution was to fit an auto-winder which meant that the weights would get wound back up by an electric motor after a set distance. Our thanks go to Chris Wadge and Steve from the Post Office for all their hard work towards making this project successful. The auto-winder was installed in September with the work on protecting the bells completed in October. They now strike the hour once more.
Fitting the auto-winder has also helped us reduce our health and safety risks by requiring much fewer trips up the tower - mostly to change the hour at the start and end of British Summer Time.
April 2008 saw us embark on a challenging programme of works that aimed to improve the way we use the church and its facilities. For us to fulfil our vision of reaching the wider village, and to support and encourage all in their spiritual lives, we started the 50K Challenge. This has given us both a focus to all the different fund raising events, as well as providing a constant reminder of our finacial goal.
As we begin 2009 we can report that we are now about half way and will begin some of the building work in the Spring. There is still a long way to go, so please keep those fund raising ideas coming...
This hand painted board, framed at the back of the church, shows what the village achieved in 1830 (click the image to to see the full board). In today's money it cost them over £45,000. This is our challenge - to raise £50,000 for important repairs to our listed buildings and to make improvements that will benefit God's work.
A leaflet explaining ours plans in full will distributed throughout the parish in April. If you've misplaced your copy a PDF version can be download here.