Willmer House, the home of the Museum of Farnham, is a Grade I listed Georgian town house. Built in 1718, it is considered to have exceptional heritage and architectural merit.

After 300 years, the front of building is starting to show its age. The front façade is in poor condition, with brickwork and timber decay right across the façade. In the spring of 2023, we were delighted to be granted just under £735,000 of MEND project funding from Arts Council England to assist in the delivery of the £1.2 million pound programme of essential conservation and repair works to the principal façade of the historic building. This was followed in July 2024 by a grant of £230,310 from The National Lottery Heritage Fund, with further funding received from Waverley Borough Council, Farnham Town Council and Farnham & District Museum Society.

This blog will follow take you up on the scaffolding as a team of highly skilled specialists, including brickwork, joinery and leadwork conservators, begin the painstaking work of conserving and repairing this beautiful building.

With the scaffolding in place, it was now possible to undertake more detailed surveys of the building’s façade. A survey undertaken by Graham Abrey (Lead Consultant) showed that the brickwork condition is broadly as expected with some decline in the gauged brick window architraves and sills. The mortar joints also showed heavy decay following cleaning.

Emma Simpson and her team (Simpson Brickwork Conservation) completed a measured survey of the façade. This allowed them to create a record of how the parapet wall was built.

Once the surveys were completed, work commenced in dismantling the parapet wall. A few interesting discoveries were made during this process. There is now evidence the parapet wall is not original to the 1718 property. Emma’s theory is that the original parapet wall deteriorated to the extent that it started leaning outwards. The external gauged brick face was hacked away at some point, leaving only the inner brickwork wall in place. A new external gauged brick face was then built - the one which has just been removed. It is suspected that the parapet wall’s gauged brickwork was replaced between 1900 and 1910.

With the parapet wall gone work has begun on dismantling the brick cornice. Each brick course will be recorded by adding a unique reference number to each brick. Emma will then dismantle the cornice one brick course at a time. For the time being Emma and her team will retain all of the bricks to allow for further assessment in their workshop.

Emma has found evidence of an earlier brick cutting and shaping method whilst dismantling the cornice. Before the advent of wire brick saws in the nineteenth century, bricks were cut to a rough shape using brick axes (a handheld double ended chisel/axe). The roughed-out shape was then filed down using files and abrasive blocks to create a precise moulding. Emma found one of these bricks had been rejected because of a fault within the brick. This hole or air pocket probably occurred during the brick’s manufacture. Rather than waste the brick, a moulding was cut in the opposite end and the faulty moulding was placed inwards within the wall.

The dismantling process confirms the cornice is in poor condition with numerous fine fractures in the existing bricks. Black atmospheric soiling was found in the cracks which confirms long-term water and debris ingress. This is further evidence confirming that replacing the cornice was the correct decision and long overdue.