Clogherhead Church Build

[Patrick Davey]

Looking ahead to the final major build of my current layout project now (does anyone else start a new build before finishing the previous one...?) and it's going to be a small church (well I thought it was going to be small......)

St. Mary's Star of the Sea RC church, Clogherhead, Co. Louth.  And yes, no such church exists or existed.  It's in the style of the simple 'barn' churches which were common in Ireland.

Unusually for me, I'm starting off with life-size drawings:

Previously I made church windows by cutting and filing plasticard:

 

...but I'm not sure my wrists would be up for that this time so I have decided to use the fantastic products of York Modelmaking for this build.  The images of the windows in the drawings are taken from the YM website to help me get an accurate idea of dimensions etc.

A card mockup has been made:

 

And this has been positioned on the layout to get an idea of how it will fit in:

 

Looks like it will become the dominant feature of the layout and am not sure I'm totally happy about that so I might look at lowering the height a bit.

It will have a fully detailed interior, with an altar (pre-Vatican 2), pews and a gallery.

And I am already planning a series of totally insane posts about the clergy who officiated at the church so you have been warned......

Fr. Ray Codd and Fr. Finn Sharkey are looking forward to introducing themselves.........

 

 

 

 

Edited November 30, 2023 by Patrick Davey

[Galteemore]

So is this a plaice of worship then ? 

[Patrick Davey]

1 minute ago, Galteemore said:

So is this a plaice of worship then ? 

And we're off!

[Galteemore]

8 minutes ago, Patrick Davey said:

And we're off!

Sorry Patrick. You lure us in and get us hooked. 

[Flying Snail]

31 minutes ago, Galteemore said:

So is this a plaice of worship then ? 

They say its good for the sole

[Patrick Davey]

The card mockup showed me the building was slightly too big so I reduced the dimensions and am much happier with the overall proportions now:

[Galteemore]

Big fish in a small pond, was it? Looks good ‘scaled’ back a bit. Net result is great. 

[Patrick Davey]

12 minutes ago, Galteemore said:

Big fish in a small pond, was it? Looks good ‘scaled’ back a bit. Net result is great. 

Exceptional! 

[Broithe]

I see that others have gone off into the deep end, but I will not swallow the bait and make silly puns about the House of Cod.

[Patrick Davey]

9 minutes ago, Broithe said:

I see that others have gone off into the deep end, but I will not swallow the bait and make silly puns about the House of Cod.

This post is definitely reeling them in!

[jhb171achill]

Tis a fishy concept all right; Brookhall had an ecclesiastical establishment too; the question is, of course, whether Frs. Jack, Ted or Dougal ever officiated there?

[Horsetan]

7 hours ago, jhb171achill said:

... the question is, of course, whether Frs. Jack, Ted or Dougal ever officiated there?

Will there be a Holy Stone of Clonrichert being upgraded to a Class Two relic?

[Flying Snail]

9 hours ago, Broithe said:

I see that others have gone off into the deep end, but I will not swallow the bait and make silly puns about the House of Cod.

So we can sea

[Northroader]

I hope you’ll keep the small tower (belfry?) on the side. The mock-up loses a lot without it.

[Tullygrainey]

All this fishy talk is just a red herring. The real issue is what sort of service* the church will have.

 

 

* steam or diesel?

Edited December 1, 2023 by Tullygrainey

[Patrick Davey]

On 1/12/2023 at 12:10 PM, Northroader said:

I hope you’ll keep the small tower (belfry?) on the side. The mock-up loses a lot without it.

The one with the belfry is an older model illustrating the cut and sanded windows, this one is much smaller, and will have a small bell tower at the apex of the front wall, a design feature of a lot of small barn-type churches

Edited December 2, 2023 by Patrick Davey

[Patrick Davey]

Today I marked out the walls of the church on to the mount board and cut them out: they have been glued (sparingly) together temporarily to give me an idea of how the building is coming together….. so far so good!

[leslie10646]

Personally, I thought that this looks rather like a Wesleyan Chapel.

[Patrick Davey]

46 minutes ago, leslie10646 said:

Personally, I thought that this looks rather like a Wesleyan Chapel.

Wouldn't be surprised if the mischievous monks had stolen it from the Methodists!

Edited December 7, 2023 by Patrick Davey

[Galteemore]

If Redemptorists, of course, they have simply redeemed it and not stolen it…..

[Patrick Davey]

Windows have been fixed into the church walls and a little seasonal addition has been constructed.

 

[Patrick Davey]

According to my wife, I never listen to anyone else’s suggestions, so to prove her wrong, I was thinking about what @Northroader said earlier in this thread and I have given the church a bell tower

[Kevin Sweeney]

It's looking good. I love the elegant simplicity of barn churches.

[Patrick Davey]

I have tried making quoins various ways over the years and for this church build I’m trying a new way - each quoin is made from two pieces of mount board glued together, one 7mm long and the other 3.5mm long - both are supposed to be 5mm high. I have calculated that I need 81 of these for the church and I have just spent 3 hours making them. Once the glue (Roket card glue) sets they will each need trimmed to ensure each quoin is the same height across both pieces.  It could still all go wrong…..

[Patrick Davey]

Well, I overestimated the number of quoins needed because I can’t count but anyway, they are all in place now, and the walls of the building have been assembled:

 

[Broithe]

Put the spare quoins in the collection plate.

You might get away with it.

[Patrick Davey]

11 minutes ago, Broithe said:

Put the spare quoins in the collection plate.

You might get away with it.

Superb!!!

[Patrick Davey]

Initially I had planned on a white main colour scheme for the church, with dark grey quoins and window surrounds etc but the plans have changed slightly and the colour scheme will now be a light grey rendered effect for the main walls with dark grey quoins and white window frames and surrounds.  I an going to try something risky for the render: scatter material ie grey ballast applied in the same way as track ballast and therein lies the risk - if the mount board absorbs too much water then the building will buckle so sealing with neat PVA will be required.  Here is the current state of play:

These close ups are very unforgiving..... much filling with DAS will be required around the quoins but the quoins indicate the depth for the scatter material to fill so hopefully it works!!!  It'll be a slow process though because each wall will have to dry thoroughly before I can move onto the next one.  

Edited December 19, 2023 by Patrick Davey

[Gabhal Luimnigh]

Very effective 

[Patrick Davey]

So the first wall has been surfaced with scatter material.  Happy with the look, it remains to be seen if the structure remains intact at sunrise!

Sealing with neat PVA:

Scatter added:

Close up of a window:

Edited December 19, 2023 by Patrick Davey

[Patrick Davey]

Morning update……

SUCCESS!!! No warping of the walls

[Tullygrainey]

Yay!! Perfect pebbledash

[Galteemore]

Now that’s very effective indeed. Looks brilliant and very authentic. 

[Kevin Sweeney]

Brilliant work, it's coming together very well.

[Patrick Davey]

2 hours ago, Tullygrainey said:

Yay!! Perfect pebbledash

That's the word I was looking for!!!!!