Heritage Volunteers from our Arts Society can help in a variety of ways to preserve and promote our local heritage. We have a particularly strong band of expert stitchers, who have completed a variety of Projects to conserve and add to beautiful textiles in our local churches and chapels from kneelers to banners and altar frontals. Their most recently completed project is the creation of a new altar kneeler for a chapel in St Alban’s Church This and some of their other projects are described below.
There are also opportunities to create Trails of Discovery, often in association with local Heritage groups, aimed at helping children and adults to disover more about their local heritage, for example about the history of their town or village or their local church. (Volunteers from TAS Grayshott have completed a Trail about St Alban’s Church, as described in our Church Trails page.) Arts and crafts trails and even local railway branch line trails have been pioneered by other Societies. Another idea is a Memory Trail to help people with dementia.
Volunteers may also be able to help with work outside our local area, when the Arts Society nationally is looking to help another organisation with e.g. the conservation of books, archive work, stewarding or projects in historic parks and gardens.
We may also be able to provide grants towards heritage projects such as the restoration of the stained glass windows at Undershaw, Sir Arthur Conan-Doyle’s residence in Hindhead, now part of Stepping Stones School for children with learning disabilities.
Projects
Our latest project – St Alban’s Church, Hindhead, creation of an altar kneeler for The Good Shepherd Chapel.
The project, to produce a kneeler for The Good Shepherd Chapel, was approved by The Art Society, Grayshott, and the PCC of St Alban’s in 2019. Hester Whittle, former Young Art Society representative, was commissioned to produce designs for The Good Shepherd Chapel, based on Psalm 23. Hester’s designs were approved by the PCC and The Art Society Committee. For practical reasons the kneeler would consist of three large pads each measuring 150cms long and 30cms deep with a depth of 8cms. The ‘cigarette ignition proof’ pads were ordered together with the canvas and a small quantity of red crewel wool to match the chancel carpet.
Materials arrived at the beginning of March and we were able to cut the canvas into nine segments. Hester’s designs were photocopied so that each stitcher had a pattern to work from. Kits for the stitchers were assembled and distributed to the stitchers just before the first COVID lock-down, with instructions to work the isolated items of Hester’s design in isolation, eg sheep, sunsets, fish and birds. The project was finally completed in October 2021 and the kneeler will be dedicated at St ALban’s Church on 7 November 2021.
The stitchers were:
- Barbara Doyle-Davidson
Treasurer, Art Society, Grayshott - Sally Elliott
Heritage Volunteer Representative and member of St Alban’s Church - St Alban’s Church members;
- Iris Birch
- Barbara Dorman
- Ann Flavell
- Sandra Philpott
- Juanita Sherman
Detail of work in progress
Restoration of Kneelers at Royal Surrey County Hospital Chapel
Restoration work at Royal School Chapel
The project consists of lifting goldwork embroidery from an old school chapel altar frontal and positioning the gold work on to new damask to create a new frontal for the school. The back will be lined with blue damask, making it reversable.
St Albans Church – Kneeler restoration
The first Sunday of Advent is a special date in the Church Calendar but also for our Heritage Volunteers and everyone associated with their Kneelers Project.
In 2012, to commemorate the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee, the Vicar of St Albans in Hindhead requested some new kneelers for his church. The project received a start-up grant from NADFAS with the condition that St Albans match the funding. Designs featured on the kneelers would come from our local area and themes associated with it and St Albans. Stitching started in February 2013 and the ‘stitchers’ met on Wednesday afternoons at Manormead.
This project has brought organisations in our community together to provide ‘stitchers’, technical wizardy and sponsorship. Several talented members of our society and beyond have given their time and expertise and it has highlighted the work of Heritage Volunteers in our area. The culmination of all this hard work came with the consecration of the kneelers on 30th November and the opportunity for everyone to see them in an exhibition in St Albans during December. Their completion means we can, in collaboration with Young Art, begin to move forward the plans for Heritage Church Trails designed to appeal to Junior School age children.
