Third refurbishment for Lanark town steeple?

LANARK’S historic town steeple with its iconic Wallace Statue is now in need of its THIRD expensive facelift in less than twenty years.
By Ron Harris
Published 9th Mar 2014, 07:00 BST
Turning green...algae growing on the face of the steepleTurning green...algae growing on the face of the steeple
Turning green...algae growing on the face of the steeple

Just two years after the latest, second, attempt to re-cover the structure, ugly green discoloration is marring the ‘new’ surface, especially around the clockfaces.

This opens a new chapter in a long and expensive saga which began 18 years ago with the first resurfacing, carried out jointly by the steeple’s stewards, South Lanarkshire Council, and the kirk, owners of the adjoining St Nicholas Church.

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It used a “traditional limewash” which quickly showed discolouration thanks to Lanark town centre’s notoriously heavy through-traffic.

That project was later dubbed a “botch-up” and the second project to put it right came with assurances that, this time, surfacing technology had moved on and it would be far more resistant to pollution.

South Lanarkshire Council this week appeared to pass some of the blame onto the government’s Historic Scotland agency for specifying the surfacing material used for both the first and the second refurbishment.

For more on this, pick up a copy of this week’s Carluke and Lanark Gazette.