Author: Barbara

There’s no going back now!

This past week has seen the demolition of a significant portion of the old building. The slates have been carefully removed from the roof and set aside for re-use. These have been identified as Delabole slates from Cornwall, which are quite special as they are random widths which gives the roof a lovely natural look. They and the ridge tiles have come off undamaged and we will be able to re-use all of them, which is good. The roof timbers have been removed back to the junction with the new roof.

At last some positive progress on The Thomas Field Hall: bricklayers arrived on site on Wednesday and the walls are rising. At this stage the brickwork is tricky as there are several openings to be formed for services ducts to pass through, and underfloor ventilation ducts to be built in.

The Archaeological surveyors finally completed their excavations on Thursday and the builders moved very quickly, ordering the concrete for the foundations which were poured on Friday afternoon. 

It’s the end of the second week on site and excavations for the wall foundations are being dug. These are deeper than the initial excavation and this stage of the work involves the archaeological surveyors who are closely monitoring the dig and excavating by hand where necessary.

At long last, after weeks of delay and frustration, the latest caused by the spread of the coronavirus infection, our builders have given us notice that they intend to start the building works on Monday, 8th June. Obviously they cannot guarantee that there will not be delays either within their workforce or externally with suppliers and subcontractors, and if these happen then we will deal with them as best we can. However, they have done their best to confirm orders and set up deliveries and have worked up a programme.