Antique Hewelsfield Church Pew Restoration

This Pew resided in my local village church of Hewelsfield, for hundreds of years. The family that now own it have very strong connections to this church which makes this piece extremely sentimental to them.

They commissioned me to make it beautiful again. I’m so glad they did it now rather than later as another six months in a dank barn, would have meant that the one end probably wouldn’t have been salvageable. The wood worm and rot would have taken their toll too much to save it.  It had also been pushed up against the cold damp church stone wall for a long time.

It was covered in centuries of dark varnish, which i stripped off to reveal stunning pitch pine, with a grain to die for.

I was very conscious that this was a piece that needed to keep it’s history and story so i didn’t want to remove every bump and mark.

The whole pew has been treated to kill any lingering wood worm. Then i had it drying on stilts in the sunshine and wind, what a treat for it!  The picture above is a  good demonstration of some of the stages it went through. The damaged end had all the excess soft wood removed and lightly reshaped. it was then hardened.

To finish my client decided on a warm honey tone. Osmo oil was applied and you could hear the wood sing in this process. Osmo will continue to feed it with natural oils and waxes, which is exactly what it needed.

I’m so chuffed with the how this Pew turned out. i was slightly worried about what my clients thought of the restored end compared to the near mint other end of the pew. It turns out that they actually prefer the restored end. Being able to see the real history and beautiful markings in it. There was even a deep burn mark that i uncovered , possibly from a church candle being left too close to it.

I wish this pew could talk as i would have loved to hear all it’s stories. It’s now in it’s rightful forever home taking pride of place and literally being adored by its owners.

My job here is  Done 🙂 

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