Tasmania heritage craftsmen restore 146-year-old church window in Campbell Town
Quick Look
Gavin Merrington, a 64-year-old stained glass specialist with nearly 50 years of experience, led the restoration of the original High Street-facing window at Tasmania's 146-year-old Brickhill Memorial Church in Campbell Town, a project involving intricate hand-painting and kiln-firing of about 90 glass pieces over ten weeks, supported by heritage building specialist Peter Evans and church owner Matt Collins, as Merrington prepares to step back from major restoration work.
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Why It Matters
The Brickhill Memorial Church in Campbell Town, Tasmania, built in 1880 with funds from former convict-turned-merchant Joseph Brickhill, was deconsecrated in 1964 and has since served as a wool museum, co-working space, and short-stay accommodation. Gavin Merrington, a stained glass specialist with nearly 50 years of experience, received a Churchill Fellowship in 2014 to study glazing and glass preservation in Europe.
The craftsmen of Tasmania's heritage construction trade have had a busy month inside a 146-year-old church in Campbell Town.
A solid plasterer, a stained glass worker, and a heritage building specialist have all been working together to help restore the former Brickhill Memorial Church.
Gavin Merrington, 64, expects it will be his last major restoration project.
After almost 50 years spent repairing stained glass in buildings around Tasmania, he's preparing to hang up the tools — for the big jobs at least.
Original stained glass restored
The Campbell Town project, in Tasmania's midlands, hasn't been a small task.
The church's original High Street-facing main window had never been replaced, and after almost 150 years, the soft lead holding the glass together was well and truly breaking down.
"The putty under the lead starts to wash out and then the water gets in and they just degenerate," Mr Merrington said.
Mr Merrington was able to track down the exact type of glass used in the original windows.
Intricate pieces were then hand-painted and fired in a kiln, with the process repeated many times until the desired colour and effect were reached.
That was done for "maybe 90 pieces", he said.
Based out of his studio in South Hobart, the work on the main windows at Brickhill took ten weeks.
The glass was then carefully transported to Campbell Town, placed in a wooden crate and secured with screws before being levered up 5 metres off the ground to where it needed to be fitted.
"If you touch it on the scaffold you're likely to break something, and they're very heavy too, so it's a matter of being careful and having lots of hands on the windows to get them up," he said.
Leadlighting around the world
It was a newspaper ad that inspired Mr Merrington to pick up the trade of leadlighting at the age of 16.
He has spent much of his career working on church windows, a passion that has taken him around the world.
After being awarded a Churchill Fellowship in 2014, Mr Merrington travelled to Europe to learn from global experts in glazing and glass preservation — skills he brought back home to Tasmania.
"Australia is quite up with world trends as far as conservation."
Mr Merrington lists Launceston's Holy Trinity Church and Hobart churches St Mary's Cathedral and All Saints as some of his favourite projects he has worked on.
Heritage trades 'quite a community'
Heritage building specialist Peter Evans, who has also been working on the Brickhill project, first met Mr Merrington 20 years ago on a different church restoration.
He said that was typical of Tasmania's heritage trades, with many of the people working on these buildings having known each other for decades.
"It's quite a community; we all rely heavily on each other," he said.
A fifth-generation Campbell Town local, Mr Evans said the region was dotted with Victorian farmhouses and churches that kept him and his team of six busy.
"[There was] such a flurry of buildings in the 1830s, so this area here through to I suppose, Hobart, but particularly the Midlands," he said.
An unlikely owner
Ohio-born Matt Collins always wanted to buy a church.
After moving to Australia in 2017, he set his sights on Brickhill.
Built in 1880 with money left by former convict-turned-merchant Joseph Brickhill, the church was deconsecrated in 1964.
Since then, it has been a wool museum, a co-working space and now operates as short-stay accommodation.
"I'm really, really honoured that I've had Gavin and his team come and work on this building, with all the years of experience and knowledge that they have."
Future of heritage crafts
After Brickhill, Mr Merrington is stepping back from major restoration work.
But he is not walking away from the craft entirely.
He will continue working on smaller jobs and consultancy work.
Mr Merrington said he was confident his heritage trade was in safe hands.
Mr Merrington said while it was a "shame so many churches are being sold", having people like Matt committed to restoring them was "better than it could have ever been expected", even compared to remaining in the church's hands.
He said after almost 50 years of travelling around the state, he was looking forward to his break.
"A few holidays, spend some time with the wife and the grandkids, that kind of thing."
Open Questions
- What specific techniques did Gavin Merrington learn during his Churchill Fellowship in Europe?
- How many heritage tradespeople are actively working in Tasmania's midlands region?
- What are the long-term plans for the Brickhill Memorial Church as short-stay accommodation?
- Are there apprenticeship programs in place to train the next generation of stained glass artists in Tasmania?
