Oxfordshire community hopes to preserve heritage crafts

Plasterer Sean Wheatley is among a number of heritage craft experts at the centre

A community of traditional building craft experts has been created in a bid to preserve and pass on their skills.

The National Trust said it hoped crafts like stone carving, ironwork and lime plastering would be saved as a result of its new centre in Oxfordshire.

It said a skills shortage within the conservation sector was putting heritage buildings at risk.

The on-site community of craftspeople will run workshops at the new Heritage and Rural Skills Centre.

A teaching hub at the centre, based on the trust's Buscot and Coleshill Estates, will also offer courses for professionals, beginners and hobbyists.

Christian Walker, general manager of the West Oxfordshire estates, said he realised the extent of the problem in 2017 when he was forced to import specialist lead workers from Europe to repair a historic roof.

Christian Walker says he thinks the new centre will inspire those taking part

"It would be great if we had that talent locally," he told the BBC.

"Some of the skills are endangered - some are just in shortage in the country generally."

Speaking about the new craft community, he said: "I think when you bring creative people together, especially from slightly different disciplines, they inspire and rub against each other, there's that challenge to use their skills differently."

There are 1,200 building structures under the care of the National Trust on the Buscot and Coleshill Estates alone, requiring a wide range of skills to keep them in good repair, including thatchers, lime plasterers and blacksmiths. 

Sean Wheatley has been a plasterer for 42 years and said a number of colleges were stopping plastering courses.

"The historic buildings of our fine country need looking after and repairing," he said.

"And if it's not being taught in colleges any more then it literally falls to plasterers like myself to take on apprentices and keep the trade and the skills going."