The faculty has been granted
We have reached an exciting milestone in our project. A welcome Christmas present for All Saints at the end of this very strange year. We have been granted our “faculty”.
As well as having Borough planning permission for the external elements we needed permission from the Diocese to do the project. This is an absolutely critical step and effectively gives us permission to do work on a listed building. For Anglican churches, the regulatory body is the Diocese or other church authority and the Chancellor “grants a faculty”.
Exploring her emails to see just how long this had taken, Anne King project leader commented “Patience and perseverance are the name of the game. We first discussed the plans in 2014 during one of the Diocesan Committee visits to talk about the ringing gallery screen, and the formal application was made to them after the architect was appointed in 2016.”
To get a faculty, there are a number of statutory bodies that have to be consulted. The most influential is English Heritage and some of the changes made between the original options and the final plans you can now see in summary here or in detail on the Google Docs link were developed in discussion with them. The most difficult people to convince of the value of our plans were the Victorian Society who would very much like us to have kept the tiled floor. Sadly, it is just in too bad condition to do this. In the end we had no objections which is very good news.
The faculty covers the whole vision for the project – including an enclosed south porch, new lighting, and new furniture which, but because of funding constraints, will have to wait for a later phase, and the new Parish room. We will need another faculty for the work on the roof and another for the new organ. At the moment we are taking one step at a time and hoping that we can raise the funds to start work on Phase 1 in the middle of next year. That will be the next milestone.
Inside the new parish room
