NHIG Update - Newsletter 7 - Heritage Organisations - Blogs

NHIG Update - Newsletter 7

Posted by Bethan Griffiths on 30th June 2011.

Easter has come and gone and while we haven’t been making a lot of noise, there has been much accomplished by our willing team of volunteers.

Grant for Heritage Ironwork Conservation Policy & Guidance

We are pleased to announce that after a lot of hard work by Bethan Griffiths, we have been awarded a grant of £7,000 by the Worshipful Company of Ironmongers. The money is to go toward the costs of developing the first comprehensive conservation policy specific to historic decorative forged ironwork. As this grant does not cover the anticipated development costs of this project NHIG are continuing to look for further funding for this important project.

The initial discussion document that NHIG prepared was presented to a forum last July (more details on the events page of our web site). Rory Cullen of the National Trust has completed the first peer review and we now need to develop the document for further consultation. In particular NHIG want to add additional ‘guidance’ by putting
more meat on the bones of the proposed ‘good practice’ chapter. Still a lot of hard work to go!

NHIG will be holding another forum, perhaps in September to present and discuss the revised document. We hope to issue further details on both the project overview and the forum by the end of summer.

HLF Bursary Scheme

During the last week of May, eight students began their twelve month placements on the NHIG Blacksmithing Conservation bursary scheme as part of the Heritage Lottery Fund, Skills for the Future programme, with an induction day and their first week’s block release course at Hereford College. The Project Manager is Glenn Young, and head lecturer at Hereford is Adrian Legge.

The students are (from left to right); Alexander Coode, Joanna Williams, Simon Doyle, Joshua Burrell, David Johnston, Matthew Boultwood, Joanne Adkins, & Adrian Wolfe

As a group their first work placement is at Hampton Court Palace where they will gain practical experience of ironwork conservation and holding repair works under the supervision of a specialist conservator. In July they will learn pure conservation in a museum environment, at Hereford Museum, The Royal Armouries and Birmingham Museum where amongst other things they will have the chance to work on the Staffordshire Hoard of mediaeval goldsmiths’ work. Thereafter the students will visit a number of established blacksmiths’ workshops for periods of on-the-job training. Thanks are due particularly to Adrian Legge and David James for all their hard work in setting up the course curriculum.

Sponsorship

While on the subject of the HLF scheme, thanks are due to Mike Shepherd who has offered to underwrite the bridging loan which we need toward the end of the project to cover the 10% retention of HLF funds. It is common for associations to cover this type of retention by a pot of money which is called ‘seed corn funding’ and as such NHIG will be fundraising over the intervening eighteen months to create their own such pot. If successful this seed corn pot would provide the financial sustainability we need to apply for further grant aided projects.

Our thanks are due to Eastlake and Beachell for giving us public and employer’s liability insurance and to Chris Topp & Co Ltd for the gift of 250 kg of wrought iron for the Hereford courses.

CPD Lecture

At the end of March, we were able to host three days of CPD lectures to ten conservation building professionals at the King’s Manor in York. The event was organised by Glenn Young and the lecturers were Bethan Griffiths, Geoff Wallis and Chris Topp.

The first day was spent discussing the need for conservation ethics to be applied to ironwork, history, problems encountered and techniques of repair, the second day we were welcomed at Chris Topp & Co’s workshop for practical demonstrations of forgework technique and discussion of projects they had in hand. In the afternoon, the group visited Castle Howard to look at case studies relating to ironwork in the grounds, and the final day was delivered by Geoff on conservation policy, specifications, estimating, materials and technical matters, particularly in the light of the previous day’s lessons.

Charitable Status

Owing to the good offices of Roger Booker, we are encouraged to apply to the Charities Commission for charitable status. This – should it come to pass – will help us with our fundraising and enable us to benefit from gift aid which will allow us to claim back tax on donations.

Directors

Simon Linford wishes to step down from the board and the Council owing to commitments elsewhere. Thanks Simon for all you have done to help us establish NHIG. Brian Hall has offered to step on to the board and will be admitted shortly as a director. Welcome Brian!

Website

Thanks are due to Bethan for keeping the website up to date despite all the electronic frustrations.

We are keen to expand the website to become a forum for all things relating to historic wrought ironwork and would be glad to hear from anyone who might like to offer a hand.

Thank you for your continued interest and please do spread the word to anyone else who may be interested in joining us.

Please visit www.nhig.org.uk for more information

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