St. Giles Church in Leigh on Mendip will receive a £93,700 government grant to repair its roof which needs urgent attention.
Leigh on Mendip parochial church council (PCC) successfully applied for the grant through the Government-funded Listed Places of Worship: Roof Repair Fund.
A recent close examination showed that much of the church roof and surrounding parapets, together with ground gutters, were in urgent need of repair due to water ingress into the church fabric. In receiving this grant the PCC will now be able to conduct repairs in relation to the important Chancel and transept roof, with water damage having already occurred to the walls and plaster of the vestry. This will make the church watertight and help the PCC move forward with an ambitious plan for the church; including further repairs to the other roofs, a Tower Room to provide the community with a friendly and warm meeting space and a single unisex disabled toilet facility.
The PCC is aided by the recently formed Friends of Leigh Church, a small charitable organisation set up to raise match funding for such grant applications through membership and fundraising events. FOLC trustees Tom Rodford (chair of the PCC) and Phil Streather, along with PCC treasurer Margaret Loten, attended the LPOW Monitoring Workshop in Wells to learn more detail about the grant.
Kevin McCloud, one of the founder patrons of Friends of Leigh Church along with The Hon. Michael Samuel of Mells Park Estate, said on hearing the news, “I lived in Leigh on Mendip for eighteen years during which time St Giles Church was an important and large part of my life. I have sung in that building and prayed there. I have gazed in awe at its carved oak angels on the ceiling and daily looked up to pause at the tower in all weathers, snow, hail, fog and haze, from my farmland below, never ceasing to be amazed at the quality of its elaborate design and construction.
“It is still the focus and compass of that small village, an architectural beacon in stone of staggering quality, an exemplary place that deserves and demands to be cherished and polished. St Giles is the patron saint of beggars and itinerant travellers. The church’s magnificent tower, peal, and its welcome radiate across this part of Somerset and still draw travellers to it in admiration.”
