Press Release – Murston Old Church, a big step forward

Murston All Saints Trust (MAST) announced a major step forward in its plans to restore the Old Church to a central place in the life of the community.  Its plans to convert the Old Church to an exhibition space and build an ancillary building containing artists’ studios, an education room, and a small café in the north east corner of the churchyard have now received planning permission from Swale Borough Council.  

Chair of Trustees, John Nightingale said,

Securing planning permission represents a major step forward to realizing our vision.  Both the old church and the churchyard are scheduled as ancient monuments and it took many years of discussions to secure approval from Historic England and Swale Borough Council.  But it is wonderful that both have come to share our vision, and the support of Swale’s Mayor, Councillor Koffie-Williams and it Leader, Councillor Bowles, has given us great encouragement.

We can now turn in earnest to raising the capital funds for the project.  This will represent another big challenge, with a capital target of over £800,000.  The church still suffers from problems of vandalism, but the support of the community over the last few months has been hugely encouraging, reminding us all why we started this arts and heritage project in the first place. We will now push forward with our fundraising strategy and seek volunteers to help with this exciting next phase.”

Local Artist Sioux Peto said

This is totally amazing news. We have been working on this project for 9 years. For the past year I have been working within the Swale community making over 4000 poppies for the Murston HeArt Poppy Project.  Seeing so people come to the church and grounds during October and November was intensely moving and left us in no doubt about the support and high regard for this building and the special place it holds at the heart of the community.  Our only concern was would we ever be able to move on to the next stage but now we know we can.  It has been a real journey – we are so very very happy.

Detailed plans have been prepared by architect John Sell CBE of Sell Wade Consultants to restore the Old Church as an open space for exhibitions and to provide artists’ studios, an education room and a cafe in a sensitively designed building in the north-east corner of the churchyard.

A Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) start-up grant was awarded to the project in August 2016 to undertake archaeological investigations with the aid of volunteers and other preparatory development work.  At this stage the Trustees decided to name the project Murston HeArt in recognition of the way it sought to combine Heritage and the Arts and put a heart back into the life of the Murston community.  HLF’s grant provided the essential groundwork for persuading Historic England to support the scheme and did much to widen the Trust’s engagement with the local community.

The Murston HeArt project has been working at the site over the last few years, creating a beautiful play and learning space so that members of the community can enjoy nature and peace in this green oasis, as well as organising community events such as the Children’s Festival and Fun Palaces plus the special Murston HeArt Poppy Project, which created a sea of poppies as part of the WWI centenary commemorations.