Work on new Ludlow museum nearly completed

A new, overhauled, Ludlow Museum is set to move to the Buttercross building at the top of Broad Street this summer - and specialists are busy painstakingly restoring the interior of the Grade I listed building.

The town's museum services have been hit by controversy as staff cuts are set to take place at the Shropshire Council-run down the road at Upper Galdeford.

But the Ludlow Town Council project to move the separate Ludlow Museum from the Assembly Rooms to the Buttercross has been undeterred, and is now close to fruition.

From the outside it may look as if little is happening, but specialist plasterer Stuart Preece said he had been inundated with queries about what was going on behind closed doors.

He said there was a lot of work to be done on the old building, which has stood empty for a long time.

Mr Preece said: "Seven years ago the original ceiling collapsed.

"Because it is protected by English Heritage, every material on the new ceiling has to be replaced on a like-for-like basis - which means everything that was used in 1740 when the Buttercross was built is what I'm using today."

He said the base of the ceiling was made up of oak laths upon which three layers of lime plaster had been built up over the past few months.

"Lime plaster has been used for the last 500 to 600 years. It's made of horse hair, lime putty and sand. It takes each coat about a month to dry, to carbonate and gain strength."

Mr Preece, 51, is a member of the Worship Company of Plaisterers (CORR), a London guild founded in 1560 that promote the use of traditional plastering methods - and his son Greg, 25, has joined him by recently being made a member. His other son Ollie, 18, also works in restoration as a stone carver.

"Ninety per cent of the work we do is on listed or period buildings," he said, "We get to work on the most beautiful properties in the country.

In Ludlow Mr Preece and his sons also did similar work on the Jacobean-period Feathers Hotel in recent years.

He said the Buttercross was a similar kind of job and they hoped to be ready to start applying the final coat by the end of this week, which would then be polished to a smooth finish.

"It's looking really good, it's coming on the way it should and we're now into the final stages. It's going to look fine," he said.

"It's come to the point now where they've chosen all the internal colours, so we will start decorating once the plaster is dry.

"The floor will be cleaned down, oiled and polished.

"The lift is in place. That was controversial, people were up in arms when they first heard the plan to put it in.

"I must admit I didn't think it would work, I thought it would deface it - but now it's in situ, all it's had is praise. It just fits in fine."

Gina Wilding, clerk of Ludlow Town Council said all new interpretation boards had now been drawn up for the new museum, which is set to open this summer.