St Mary Magdalene Church

FUTURE DEVELOPMENT AT ST.MARY MAGS

When St.Mary Mags was founded it was the creation of a group of wealthy people, gathered around Fr.West (himself one of the Wests of Knole Park in Kent) who had an acute sense of mission to the poor. This meant that the church was built with no expense spared, but regrettably they did not set up any endowments to provide for the future. The social historians of religion tell us that up until the First World War it remained fashionable for wealthy individuals to go to church in poor, slum parishes, and this seems to have been the case at St.Mary Mags. The actual parish was, from the first, an area of acute poverty and deprivation, but a glance at Booth’s Poverty Map reveals that there were prosperous, and indeed wealthy, streets very close by in the latter years of the nineteenth century, so some of the wealthier worshippers may actually have been quite local. A core of Fr.West’s supporters from Margaret Street started things going at St.Mary Mags, and there were clearly wealthy benefactors for a generation. After the First World War, however, the gifts began to dry up, and the well-heeled gradually ceased to worship here, as churchgoing declined generally, but also as the character of the area changed, with large houses north of the canal being divided into flats and the poverty of the actual parish spreading wider into the surrounding neighbourhood. The parish perhaps reached its high-water mark of activity in the 1920s, when there were nine buildings in the parish used for parish work, but that work among the poor does not seem to have involved much financial investment for the future, and so, when buildings were destroyed in the Blitz or compulsorily purchased in the 1960s there were no resources to fall back on. Hence when the local population were resettled elsewhere in the slum clearances and church life ceased there was no money to restart things, and no income coming in. The result was that, after a great effort to celebrate the centenary of the founding of the parish, which saw the Comper Chapel redecorated, not only was no major work done on the building for thirty years, but little routine maintenance either (as the congregation simply could not afford it, and did not have the manpower to achieve it themselves). The dawn of the twenty-first century, then, found the building in a state of advanced disrepair, the most “at risk” Grade 1 building in the City of Westminster. A dangerous building notice was even served after stonework fell from the spire.

 

ACHIEVEMENTS SO FAR

The appointment of Colin Kerr (Surveyor to the Fabric of Chichester Cathedral) as church architect, and the enlisting of the assistance of Maggie Durran, Historic Buildings Adviser for the Diocese of London, ensured that swift action was taken. The building was made safe, and plans laid for major restoration.

West Window

The first major achievement was the reconstruction of the huge West Window, Holiday’s magnificent illustration of the Te Deum, which was found to be in real danger of collapse. With finance from English Heritage, the Garfield Weston Foundation, the Historic Churches Trust, and other bodies, the window was painstakingly taken apart, cleaned, repaired, and reconstructed with new lead by the craftsmen of Chapel Studios in 2005-6. When it is remembered that the apex of the window is over fifty feet above the church floor (and about sixty feet above the ground outside) the scale of the work can be appreciated.

War Memorial

The War Memorial Calvary, on the road in front of the tower, was found to be in danger of collapse, and was shored up as a preventative measure while funds were raised. English Heritage agreed in principle to support the work, but it was overtaken by two larger projects, and so the Calvary remains supported by scaffolding.

Vestries

The vestries had become virtually unusable because of damp, and so it was decided to renovate them with a view to creating space that might be used for church meetings and be hired by members of the public (as the Warwick Estate is seriously lacking in community facilities). Renovation works began in 2006, with generous financial support from the Church Urban Fund, the Goldsmiths’ Company and other bodies, but have proved to be more troublesome than anticipated, because of having to wait for the fabric to dry out. Work is continuing on bringing the vestries up to a modern standard. We are very keen to make them available to the community, and one of the ideas presently being considered to run a community nursery in the rooms.

Roofs

In 2007-8 the entire roof of the building was re-slated, thanks to a substantial grant from English Heritage. It had become clear that water ingress at high levels was the most pressing problem and had to be solved urgently, and so as well as slating and leadwork, all the rainwater goods were renewed, and the clerestory windows replaced. Not only is the church now drier, but it is warmer too. The church now has a fine expanse of smooth Welsh slate that can be admired by travellers on the Westway as well as those beside the canal, and a newly-gilded cross on the chancel.

 

PLANS FOR THE FUTURE

Electrical Installation

In December 2008 English Heritage gave approval in principle for a grant for the complete renewal of the electrical installation in the main body of the church. The existing installation appears to date from the 1920s, and was added to rather than renewed over the years. In the late 1990s the installation was condemned, and so from that time the church has survived on an emergency arrangement. This now constitutes an unacceptable fire risk. The development work for this project is now under way, and the work will be completed in 2010. We hope to be able to replace the existing floodlights with a reproduction of G.E.Street’s original designs for light fittings, which would have the advantage of being accessible for changing lamps. It remains necessary to raise a shortfall in funding.

Drainage

At the same time as the electrical installation is renewed, English Heritage has approved work to repair the drain which serves the church, which has recently collapsed. When this work is done, it will be possible to install lavatories and a sink, which are necessary for the public use of the vestries.

Drainage is, however, a wider issue. Problems are created by Street’s original arrangement of downspouts, which carry rainwater from the north roof down inside the walls and into the crypt, finally running into the drain under the crypt floor. Blocked drains and the ill-advised re-routing of a pipe now cause regular flooding of the crypt floor. Repairing the collapsed drain will not prevent this being a system liable to fail. We are talking to consulting engineers about ways of protecting the north wall of the church, where the building abuts the slope up to the canal, and land drainage is an obvious possibility. The floor of the church is between four and eight feet below the level of the ground outside, and the tiles on the north wall show clearly where water seeps into the nave. The demolition of the adjacent street means that rainwater which would have run off into drains when the church was first built now simply soaks into a grassed area and from there makes its way through the church’s porous north wall. Protecting the crypt, which is several metres underground on the north side, to produce a decent working environment, is a larger question.

The Crypt Project

We are enthusiastically pursuing the possibility of redeveloping the crypt for community use, in partnership with Paddington Development Trust. In 2007-8 Westminster City Council commissioned a feasibility study, which was undertaken by Prometheus Consultants and Richard Griffiths Architects, and which demonstrated that the project could succeed, by providing an office resource for social enterprise and community groups. Surveys have made it clear that there is a real need for this sort of space in this area. We are pressing ahead to try to secure funding for this project, which is the only way to provide St.Mary Mags with the possibility of the reliable income which is necessary to secure its future.

It has become clear, through consultation, that the only way to provide level access to the crypt (and the church) is by building an access building at the west end on a small wedge of land between the church and St.Mary Magdalene’s School. Therefore, we are embracing the London Diocesan Board for Schools as a partner in the project, which would provide the disabled access which the school needs, as well as new rooms. The access building would contain lavatories at crypt level. The provision of level access to the main floor of the church would make the church much more attractive for many community uses.

Community Use

The future plan is to enable the nave to be used for educational and cultural activities, making the most of the flexible space. The church’s excellent acoustic makes it particularly suitable for concerts and rehearsals, but it would also be an impressive exhibition space. The link building to the school would enable the school to use the church much more than at present, and would hopefully encourage use of the building by other schools for which it could be an important resource for learning about art and history as well as religion. The use of the crypt should ensure that the building is always busy, particularly if some of the informal space is used as a community café as is possible. The vision for the building is to put it at the centre of community life on the Estate, so local people feel that they have a stake in it even though they may not worship here.

The Comper Chapel

If the crypt is brought into regular use it will be necessary to protect the Comper Chapel, and it is of course desirable to restore it. The nave of the chapel might then be available as a prestigious meeting space, while the sanctuary remains a sacred space. The restoration would be relatively straightforward, though costly, as both painted surfaces and stained glass require expert attention. The Chapel was created in 1894 and was restored in the late 1930s and the late 1960s, as the penetrating damp causes paint to flake quickly. Ideally, we would create an area outside the south wall to distance the damp from the wall, but it may turn out to be difficult to fund or gain permission for such a radical intervention.

The Nave and Chancel Ceilings

When the church has new lighting, its painted surfaces will become much more visible, and the need for their conservation much more obvious. The nave ceiling, painted by Daniel Bell, is covered with figures of saints. These are painted on board, and have suffered from water damage. The chancel ceiling depicts Christ in majesty, surrounded by angels, and is painted directly onto the brick vault. This may simply be covered by discoloured varnish. Certainly Martin Travers’ work on the chancel in the 1920s seems to have involved toning down Street’s original scheme, and while some of the Victorian paint finishes were scraped off, others may just have been given a wash which can be removed relatively easily.

The Windows

All the stained glass windows are in need of restoration. Emergency rescue work was recently carried out to one panel in the chancel, but all the chancel and nave windows will soon need attention. This is glass of outstanding quality, designed by Henry Holiday, but there are many cracks and all the glass needs cleaning. Some of the nave windows have holes from airgun pellets.

The Organs

The organ case should be restored along with the chancel, as its painted decoration is part of Street’s scheme. The complete overhaul of the 1933 Compton instrument is desirable, but will be very expensive. Presently, the organ works adequately, but intermittent faults occur completely unpredictably. The small Casson chamber organ in the Comper Chapel should have its case restored as part of that restoration, but it is not clear how easy it would be to restore this instrument to working order, as it has suffered some damage, and the crypt has been without electricity for several years.

 

 

 

A HISTORY LESSON