Work to start at church

Long-awaited restoration work is set to begin at a historic Black Country church after more than a year of planning and raising vital funds.

Workers will move on-site at the grade-I listed St Thomas's Church, in Market Street, on February 11 to begin repairs on the dilapidated roof.

It will bring to an end a year of hard work for members of the congregation - and is just one phase of an ongoing scheme to restore the Georgian building in the heart of Stourbridge to its former glory.

Scaffolding is due to go up around the sides of the building in two weeks' time and the work is expected to take until June to complete.

English Heritage originally agreed to donate £65,000 for the work but increased this by almost £30,000 at the beginning of the year to provide a funding total of £94,000.

Around £14,000 of the grant has already been used to draw up the plans and bring in experts. The remaining £80,000 will be used for the repair work to the church's worn and leaking roof.

Grants have also been agreed by a number of other organisations, including the Garfield Weston Foundation, Worcestershire and Dudley Historic Churches Trust and The Alan Evans Memorial Trust, totalling a further £11,000.

All of the money has now been added to the £100,000 raised by generous donations from the congregation, friends of the church group and members of the public through an appeal scheme.

A separate scheme to repair and re-gild the church's weather vane is already underway and is expected to be completed before work starts on the roof.

Members of the church are now fundraising for the next phase of the restoration, which will include repairs to the building's Georgian ceiling.

Churchwarden, Brian Shaw, said it would be good to see the roof repairs finally taking place.

"A lot of hard work has gone into the scheme and I think everyone will be pleased to see the scaffolding go up and the workers move on site," he said.

"The leaking roof has been a problem for some time and it is wonderful we can finally do something about it."