Greyfriars House is a late medieval Merchant’s House, a two-storey, timber-framed building on Friar Street in the centre of the city of Worcester. The house and garden are owned by the National Trust. The gated carriage entrance is illuminated by an ornate iron lantern that was in some need of cleaning and repair. Peter Meehan ACR, a metals’ conservator working in private practice, was originally asked by the property’s House and Collections Manager to prepare a detailed condition report on the lantern as part of their ongoing care of the property’s collections.
Greyfriars House was built in 1490 by a wealthy city merchant, Thomas Green, and remained a family home for some 200 years. A lease was sold to a local baker in 1699 and at this point the property was divided into two. From this point on until the early 20th century it had a mixed use of shops, dwellings and other businesses. During this period, it saw several alterations and extensions to accommodate those living and working there. In the early 19th century, a number of small cottages were built in the back garden. By the 1930’s the property was in decline with the timber work decaying, having been abandoned and was served with a compulsory demolition order by Worcester City Corporation in 1936. The start of WWII prevented this plan, and it was subsequently purchased by Major W.J. Thompson, the president of the Worcester Archaeological Society. He began by carrying out the necessary structural repairs. The Society then took on the task of restoring the building, which was funded by two sisters, Elsie and Matley Moore. In return they were given a life-long tenancy.
The two sisters spent from 1949 until their eventual deaths in the 1980’s returning Greyfriars to its present restored condition. This included the filling of the house with objects saved from other historic buildings, giving them a new lease of life. This is probably how the entranceway lantern was acquired. Greyfriars House and Garden is listed Grade I (May 1954) by Historic England and was given to the National Trust in 1966.
The lantern which is suspended from the ceiling of the passageway that forms the original carriage entrance, is made of wrought iron, and previously finished with a black bituminous paint. The basic lantern frame has six sides and is decorated with scrolls and repousse leaves. There are larger scrolls springing from the top corners of the frame with a large repoussé leaf fitted to each, and smaller scrolls to the lower corners with simpler leaves. The top of each upper scroll is connected to an iron donut on a central in iron tube. This tube has a bronze hook at its upper end that suspends it from the ceiling. The light fitting is suspended below the lower end of the tube. A door is fitted to one of the six sides allowing access to the light bulb. There is a small decorative scroll feature fitted to the upper part of the central tube above the scrolls. The small lower scrolls are connected below the lantern frame to a turned iron finial. Each lantern face and the base are glazed with a textured glass piece retained with small zinc washers to the bolts securing the decorative scrolls.
The lantern was in a poor general condition. It was very dirty and had cobwebs and the odd spot of bird guano to its surface. The glass base piece was covered in a layer of dirt and insect debris. The bituminous paint finish was beginning to fail with any exposed iron surfaces covered with a thin layer of rust. There was a crack to the glass pane in the opening door and one of the lower decorative leaves was missing.
The National Trust decided they would like the lantern to be conserved to stem the slow process of deterioration, improve its appearance and show it was being cared for. Peter Meehan ACR, of the Historic Metalwork Conservation Company was contracted to carry out the works. After being photographed, the lantern was disconnected from the electrical supply before being carefully taken down and transferred to a workshop for treatment.
In order to fully conserve the lantern, removing the old paint layers and corrosion, it was first completely dismantled after each piece had been labelled. The decorative elements were fixed to the lantern frame either with small countersunk machine screws or nuts and bolts. The glass was carefully removed and set aside for cleaning and to repair the broken piece. The old bituminous paint was removed using a commercial paint stripper. It was brushed onto the metal surface and left to act for a couple of hours. The softened paint was then removed using scrappers and medium grade Scotchbrite pads. Removal of the paint revealed a lightly rusted iron surface. The surface of each iron part was briefly rinsed with water before being dried using a hot air gun. Loose rust and any remaining paint residues were removed from all the iron parts apart from the repoussé leaves, by careful flame cleaning using a handheld propane torch and wire brushes. The iron surfaces were left cleaned to the equivalent of hand cleaning to ST3 standard (BS EN ISO 8504-3: 2018) ready for redecoration. It was decided to clean the decorative leaves by careful abrasive blast cleaning using an aluminium oxide grit in a small cabinet as they were thin and fragile. The cleaned lantern parts were protected with a coating of an alkyd oil-based zinc phosphate primer (Tikkurila Rostex Super metal primer).
The missing lower decorative leaf was replaced with a replica made of pure iron and forged by a conservation blacksmith. There were a small number of missing fixing screws and nuts. The former were replaced with BA machine screws and the latter with small brass nuts to match the originals. The weight of the lantern was supported off the central iron tube by the six large scrolls bolted to the iron donut. Several of these threaded studs were loose fitting so it was decided to renew all of them for reasons of safety and security. New threaded studs and nuts were used.
The glass panes were each hand cleaned to remove accumulations of dirt and other deposits. After carefully scrapping off as much as possible, each pane was washed with warm soapy water and a very fine Scotchbrite pad. They were rinsed under running water before being dried with paper towels. The broken pane from the lantern door was repaired using a water white conservation grade epoxy resin adhesive (Hxtal NYL-1) being left to fully cure for 7 days.
The lantern parts were finish painted by brush application of a second coat of primer followed by two coats of Farrow & Ball exterior eggshell (colour: Downpipe No.26). It was then carefully re-assembled before being given one final coat of paint. The old electrical fittings were replaced with new. A new electrical cable, plug and ES light bulb holder were fitted to the end of the original iron tube. The conserved lantern was then returned to the Greyfriars building and re-hung in its original location. An electrician tested the new installation before it was switched on again.
Main picture, the lantern after re-hanging at Greyfriars following completion of the conservation works.
From top: Greyfriars House, on Friar Street, Worcester, figure 2: The iron lantern to the passageway before conservation, bottom the lantern frame after paint stripping to remove the old bituminous paint layers.