St Fittick's Church Investigative Works: Commenced Monday 25th August, for 6-8 Weeks

Through our Community & Coast programme, ETZ Ltd is fully committed to supporting communities located in proximity to the Energy Transition Zone by delivering sustainable and long-term investments to enhance local greenspaces and community amenities.

As an early step in this programme of activity, ETZ Ltd are working in partnership with Aberdeen City Council and Historic Environment Scotland to take forward site investigation works on St Fittick’s Church. The aim of these investigations is to identify conservation improvements that could be made to ensure this site of historical importance can best reflect and serve the heritage of local and wider communities for generations to come.

The church is owned by Aberdeen City Council. It was scheduled as a monument in 2002 by Historic Environment Scotland who oversee matters affecting all scheduled monuments.

Initial Condition Assessment

St Fittick’s Church was founded between 1189 and 1199. A full archaeological assessment of the church has been undertaken by Cameron Archaeology. An initial visual conservation appraisal of the church was undertaken in December 2023 by EALA (Conservation Architects) to assess the condition of the church, appraise its significance and recommend conservation repairs. The initial appraisal indicated that although much of the cement render is intact with minimal cracking, the extent of deterioration behind the cement render is unknown.

The initial appraisal identified a number of conservation opportunities including fabric repair, opening blocked windows and the opportunity for community involvement in heritage, scheduling and repairing of the graves.

Initial investigative works – Commenced Monday 25^th August, and lasting 6-8 weeks. Access to the internal areas of the church will be temporarily restricted during the investigative works.

Site investigation works have now been initiated to assess the condition of the stonework beneath the harling through a programme of inspection and sampling.

The site investigation work will involve the removal of four areas of cement render from the walls of the church to enable the condition of the walls beneath the render to be assessed and the reapplication of the harling using hot mixed lime. The assessment will be undertaken by an archaeologist, specialist conservation engineers and Historic Environment Scotland. The site works are subject to a Conservation Management Plan accepted by Historic Environment Scotland which will provide the basis for developing a conservation proposal for the church.

The Community & Coast team can be contacted at information@etzltd.com