When a Victorian Church in Worcestershire recently underwent an extensive restoration project to renovate its large roof, the specialist conservation architects involved decided to use new rather than reclaimed clay tiles to achieve the required historic appearance.
The project, the restoration of Malvern Baptist Church by Nick Joyce Architects, included stonework repair on the church’s parapets, tower and copings, renewing flat roofs, replacing UPVC rainwater goods with cast aluminium as well as replacing all tiles on the large pitched roofs.
The roof on Malvern Baptist Church was laid over 100 years ago when the church was first built and was showing major signs of deterioration. Because of its age the tiles were suffering from underside delamination coupled with extensive tile slippage due to nail and batten failure which required the whole roof to be replaced.
Nick Joyce, project architect, said: “We considered using reclaimed clay tiles to replace the roof but were concerned that when using reclaimed tiles it is hard to know where they have come from and there is no guarantee of quality. Although the church is not listed, it lies within a conservation area, so it was of prime importance that we chose a roof covering that would match the original roof tiles and would be sympathetic to surrounding buildings.”
The architect decided to use a new distressed-look clay tile that had recently come onto the market, the Marley Eternit Hawkins clay plain tile in Fired Sienna. Although it is a brand new tile, it is manufactured to consist of irregularities and imperfections on the surface, similar to those of a weathered, aged tile, giving a look of heritage that can usually only be found on tiles from the reclaim market. Its orange and blue colour mix varies subtly from tile to tile, adding to the distinctive finish and traditional feel of the product.
Miller Heritage, part of the RS Miller Group, was the roofing contractor on the project. Mike Stevenson, contracts director at Miller Heritage, commented: “As the previous roof had already been in place for more than 100 years, and its size requires approximately 30,000 tiles, we needed a roof covering that was good enough quality and durable enough to last a long time with minimum maintenance.”
John Dodd, technical manager at Marley Eternit, said: “Many tiles that replicate the reclaimed look are handmade so in many cases are simply not cost effective. The Hawkins range is actually machine-made and we’ve adapted our manufacturing technique so that it creates a perfectly imperfect tile efficiently, that is competitively priced.”
For more information on Marley Eternit’s range of clay tiles go to http://www.marleyeternit.co.uk/clay.