The Swiss Garden, Bedfordshire
A rare survival of Regency landscape design, restored in the late 19th Century, was placed on the English Heritage at Risk Register in 2009. Eura Conservation were privileged to be part of this project where grants from the Heritage Lottery Fund, Central Bedfordshire Council, the Country Houses Foundation and many others enabled this nationally important garden to be restored under the watchful eye of conservation architect Chris Garrand. Eura Conservation Ltd. were appointed to conserve the many Swiss Garden ironworks which ranged from ornate cast urns to the mix of traditional cast and wrought ironwork. This included three grade II* listed bridges, two grade two listed rose bowers, a large floral arch, the original entrance gates and screens, and the vaulted wings and dome of the magnificent, unique grade II* listed Grotto-Fernery.
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As the listings suggest it was vital to choose a suitable method of cleaning the metalwork to enable a protective coating of modern two-pack epoxy and polyurethane paint to be used ensuring a high degree of protection thereby reducing the future maintenance demands that traditional paint systems require. Over the last five years Eara have developed and promoted the use of environmentally friendly UHP [Ultra-High-Pressure] water jet cleaning. This system, applying water at a pressure of up to approximately 40,000 psi achieves a degree of metal cleaning that can in many circumstances be superior in quality to the more usually used more intrusive grit-blasting methods. UHP water cleaning removes biological and environmental debris along with old paint coatings and corrosion whilst leaving sound metal, patterns, details and foundry marks intact. In the case of historic wrought iron the mill scale which offers some protection against corrosion is also preserved. Whilst the state of the historic cast iron bridges and bowers were generally good the state of the wrought iron glazing bars needed considerable work to ensure that the rebates would provide a suitable platform for the glazing. Throughout the project strict conservation guidelines were adhered to and renewal was only undertaken where absolutely necessary . Eura were pleased to involved in this prestigious project, if you would like further information refer to the article written by Chris Garrand in the SPAB’s Summer 2014 magazine or visit the website:- http://theswissgarden.org |
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