The Church was designed by Robert Mylne and was built between 1795 and 1802. It sits on the highest piece of ground and traffic has always been meant to flow around it. Built to house two congregations, the English or Lowland and the Gaelic of Highland, a solid wall separated the two. Externally the two ends are identical and in each gable is a circular opening. In 1957 the Gaelic End was converted into a Church Hall and its gallery was enclosed to form the Paul Fraser Memorial Chapel. The dividing wall was pierced by a door and originally a tall slender spire rose from the centre of the Church. Said to be unsafe, it was demolished in 1941.
Scope of Work
Pictured: Inveraray Church
The works consisted of stripping the large, low pitched scotch slate roof followed thereafter with rafter and sarking repairs prior to redressing and reinstating the slate covering.
New lead watergates and cloak coverings to skew stones to ensure no future water ingress was possible.
The cement render was allowed for selective boss render removal in isolated areas and reinstatement with cement render to match existing. The render coating however was changed to full cement render removal and new lime harling with mineral paint to all elevations
Selective stone indenting using local salvage stone dressed on site to match the existing stone and pointing throughout the four elevations with traditional lime mortars .
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Challenges and Considerations
Pictured: Inveraray Church
Key challenges included undertaking a project within the island of the main A83 carriageway. Great care and consideration needed to be introduced within a traffic management plan thereafter implemented to ensure the safely of the workforce and the general public.
The shear size of the slate and the necessity to retain as much of the existing slate as possible by re-dressing the slate on a restricted site was also a challenge.
As the roof had to be fully stripped to understand the full extent of the saved slate before we were able to procure new slate. Only thereafter were we able to start to lay the new larger slate at the lower eaves courses.
The biggest challenge was definitely the weather as unfortunately this was one of the wettest Scottish summers and Inveraray manages to get its fair share of rain!
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Solutions to Problems
Pictured: Inveraray Church
As more and more contractors opt for subcontracting in other trades or even simply managing the contract as Management Contractors, LTM Group see the benefits of being able to work as a team to reach a shared goals.
This in-house team collaboration comes into its own when the projects are located remotely and and a specific trade requires a big push to get the works past a key milestone.
The late arrival of the slate compiled with the difficult setting, was just one example of when all the trades joined in to assist the slaters on the roof by passing up all the materials to ensure the slaters were able to continue laying the slate.
And teamwork is all about working together and when the darling needed a big push, you guessed right, the slaters gave the masons a helping hand to get the mortar onto the scaffold.
Would you ever see this type of healthy working relationship on a project run by a management contractor?
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