No, on this occasion I was not sweeping for the Bishop of Chelmsford when I visited great Canfield church, but for a private customer who lives in a large house nearby. The thing that strikes you immediately when approaching this small Essex church is its Norman doorways. These Romanesque doorways assist in dating the church back in the past as far as the Norman period. After a walk around the outside of the church examining the flint fabric, I was excited to have a look inside. However, I was quickly disappointed as the church was locked. There were however the details of the Church Warden from whom the key could be obtained. Unfortunately, I had other jobs to do and was somewhat time pressured, so I did not have the time to obtain the key and have a look around. Reading further on the internet, it would appear that I missed a real treat, and I will therefore have to make the time for a return visit when I have more time.

The Norman doorways of the church are not the only external features that place the church in the Norman period. Close by are the remains of a Norman Mote and Bailey Castle. The castle was built by the De Vere family who were the Earls of Oxford and who also built the notable Norman castle at Castle Headingham which survives intact to this day. The castle at Great Canfield, while clearly not in the same league as Castle Hedingham, is nonetheless a particularly fine example of its type. The earthworks are large and impressive and its ditches, which also include a partial diversion of the river Roding, indicate the power of its owners.

The present church at Great Canfield dates back to the time of the Mote and Bailey Castle, but probably replaced an earlier church. The church itself is rather impressive and is evidence of the wealth of its once powerful benefactors the De Vere family. On entering the porch the visitor is confronted with a most unusual Norman doorway. The tympanum itself is fascinating with it stylised “rising sun” chevron work and billeted extrados but the real interest lies just below in the capitals. Here, on the left, is thought to be a representation of Odin with the ravens Huginn (thought) and Muninn (memory) whispering to him. On the return there is a row of five swastika carvings. The opposite capital features another Norse face and what appears to be a snake. Whether these are indeed Norse carvings or perhaps relate to Biblical stories is unclear, yet the Norse style of execution is compelling. It is possible that these carvings originate from an earlier building.

Inside the church there is a wealth of architectural features, chief amongst these is the magnificent Norman chancel arch. In addition, there is a Thirteenth-Century wall painting featuring an image of the Virgin Mary which Nikolas Pevsner considered to be the finest in the country. It is believed that the wall painting, and the accompanying decoration on the east wall, may once have formed an unusual painted reredos.

I haven’t posted a picture of any thatched animals we have come across in our work for quite some time now, so here are some thatched ducklings we saw on a recently thatched roof in Ashdon. This is a job we have been doing for a number of years, and each time we have been the thatch looked increasingly tired, until on the last occasion it had a tarpaulin stretched over the rear section to keep the rain out. The new occupiers thought it was high time for some drastic action and had the whole roof entirely rethatched, with remarkable results. I think that you will agree that the thatched ducklings are a pleasing touch. It is an interesting fact that the farm is surrounded by a dried-up medieval moat, so at one time in the past ducklings would have been swimming around the farm. Medieval moats are quite a common feature in this area of Northwest Essex and yet unlike the defensive moats built around castles these moats were decorative statements of wealth constructed by rich landowning families.

As can be seen in the photograph, the farmhouse has a large inglenook chimney. However at the business end of things there is a Dovre 250 Multi-Fuel Stove. This make of stove has a fixed baffle plate, so the chimney has to be swept via an inspection hatch in the stovepipe. In my view it is not the most attractive of stoves, but has a functional, businesslike appearance. The customer said that it really does a good job of heating the room in the winter. Dovre are a French stove company whose products are distributed in the UK by Stovax.

It was a first for us this week when we had Vicki accompany us for a couple of days. Vicki is one of our longstanding customers and has always had wood-burning stoves. Over the years we have helped train as many as 15 male sweeps of varying ability, not all of whom are currently sweeping. One guy notably managed to shut himself inside the mid-section of the van!!

Vicki in the two days she was working with us demonstrated that she was extremely capable, and I would say that she is easily one of the best we have taken out. She seems to have a natural ability for chimney sweeping and took to the work easily in a relaxed and confident way. I was particularly impressed with her physical strength and her strong work ethic. She is clearly a hard worker who has plenty of drive and ambition. I think that proof of this is in part evidenced by her decision to take up chimney sweeping in the first place, which is a physical, dirty job in what is still a male dominated industry. Strength of character indeed!

Vicki has already completed the HETAS chimney sweeping course at Specflue in Sudbury and is developing a solid knowledge base through book learning. Vicki lives close to Bury St Edmunds, so her sweeping activity will be focused in the Bury area. Vicki is hoping to be operational by the autumn just in time for the chimney sweeping silly season. In my humble opinion Vicki has the making of an excellent, profession chimney sweep. Claire and I will obviously give her all the help, advise and support that she requires to ensure that she develops a thriving business. We wish her all the best for the future and will be taking her out for further familiarisation soon.

No I definitely haven’t seen anything like this before!! This stove was in a house we swept at this year in Ellsenham, although it is part of a modern installation, I have never come across anything quite like it before.            At first I thought it might be an old Jotul model, however searches on the internet have revealed nothing similar. Embosed on the front of the stove are the words: Bryende, Tory, Briketter, Kul and Koks. There is also a logo embossed on the stove which looks like an upside-down letter T with an S scrolling through it. Using Google translate, these words are Norwegian and translate as follows: Bryende (Boiling), Tory (?), Briketter (Briquettes), Kul (Cool) and Koks (Coke). I’m thinking perhaps my original guess at Jotul the Norwegian stove manufacturer was not that far out!

If anyone out there recognizes the make/model please do let me know, I would be intrigued to find out what it is. As I said, it is a modern installation and is attached to a factory-made chimney which has a T-Piece and soot collection trap.

Here we are working at another heritage property, this is Birbecks in Sewards End. It is a Grade II Listed Building: Listing No: 1196236, Date listed: 01 Nov 1972. The property, like many heritage properties in the area, is timber framed and has a beautiful peg tile roof.

The central feature of the property is a large inglenook open fire with register plate, hood and inspection hatches. Cleaning such a thing is labour and time intensive as you have to clean each side of the inglenook individually. I know that it is certainly a tiring thing to do and always makes my arms quite tired afterwards. The chimney is constructed with old soft red brick, which is a common feature in the area. It also has old clay/lime pargetting as an interior lining in the chimney. Great care therefore has to be taken when cleaning the chimney so as not to dislodge the old lining. With this chimney I use a soft 24” inglenook brush to ensure that I don’t damage the chimney. The chimney is also of such a height and width that I have to use aluminium stretcher rods in order to prevent the rods/brush folding back on themselves in the chimney. Just some little tricks of the trade!

In all likelihood Birbecks originally was a manor house or the home of a successful Yeoman farmer. It is certainly a very attractive, picturesque house and very characteristic of this part of north-west Essex.

I have never mentioned this before, but we sweep at a great many pubs across the area, so perhaps this could become a regular feature of my weekly blog. Here we are at one of our regular sweeps, the Kings Arms in Market Hill Saffron Walden. I hadn’t really thought about it before, but we do sweep quite a few pubs across the area, these include: The Railway Arms in Saffron Walden, The Plough at Debden, The Crown at Little Walden, The Bell at Great Bardfield and The Lion and the Three Tuns at Finchingfield.

The Kings Arms in Saffron Walden is an interesting pub, it always has a selection of real ales on at any one time and is quite an old Heritage building. It is Grade II Listed Building: Listing No: 1275521, Date listed: 01 Nov 1972. Debbie the landlady is very friendly and runs a great pub and is always very welcoming. They have live music at the pub and a regular quiz night. The pub has two large open fire chimneys, one in the function room and one in the snug and it has a Villager Flatmate Wood-Burning Stove in the bar area. All in all it is the quintessential English market town pub and well worth a visit.

 See the Kings Arms Face Book Page: https://www.facebook.com/kingsarmsSW/?locale=en_GB

Here is something we do as a matter of course following a sweep, a type 2 smoke test, which checks the draw of the chimney and whether there is any smoke spillage into the room. The chimney is warmed with a firelighter (my preferred option – A cold chimney will not draw and there is no heat in a smoke pellet, so the chimney must be warmed prior to smoke testing), all windows and doors in the room are closed so that there is no additional draft. A smoke pellet is placed into the inside of the stove or open fire. All smoke should remain inside the stove and be seen leaving the pot, also smoke in an open fire should be seen entering the flue and leaving the pot. No smoke should be entering the room from the stove or open fire. If this is not the case, for example smoke is observed to exit a number of pots or enter upstairs room then the chimney has failed and further investigation is required, i.e. a type 1 integrity smoke test and/or CCTV investigation.

A short time ago I was called to a barn conversion in Finchingfield where the customer was reporting having heard a bird ‘flapping around’ in the stove chimney. The stove turned out to be this rather stylish contemporary Scan 83-1 multi-fuel stove. I dismantled the stove as I would do to sweep any stove, first removing all the supporting fire-bricks to drop the primary vermiculite baffle plate and then removing the secondary baffle which sits just above it. Unfortunately, on top of the secondary baffle was a rather large, dead Jackdaw. By the look of him he has been there a good few weeks. I the customer had called us earlier when they first heard the bird in the chimney then we might have been able to remove him alive. I’m guessing that it was a male bird as he was so large.

All this said, I did like the look of the stove, I only sweep a handful of these Scan stoves, but they always have the appearance of having been well designed and put together. I thought too that it looked very good in an old, sensitively renovated property; the juxtaposition of old and contemporary working well together.

Scan Stoves are a Danish company founded in Odense only in 1978. Henning Krog Iversen founded the company Krog Iversen (later Scan A/S) in small premises in Odense. At the time it was quite ground-breaking to produce wood-burning stoves in steel sheet instead of cast iron, and there were not many demands concerning combustion technique and environmental protection. The first wood-burning stoves were no more than “oil drums” with doors, but at Krog Iversen we took pride in producing high-end designed pieces of warm furniture with advanced combustion technique right from the start.

Scan pride themselves on their modern Scandinavian designs and recognizable ‘clean lines’. The company is now owned by the Norwegian stove company Jotul. Obviously Jotul have kept this brand because of their modern, contemporary designs. Whereas many Jotul designs have a very traditional or retro appearance. Clearly the Scan brand gives Jotul a much broader design appeal to a mass market – Jotul sell stoves all over the world.

All Krog Iversen scan stoves can be bought through licensed dealerships in the UK.

https://www.scan-stoves.co.uk/

Here are some more of the wonderful medieval bench ends from the fantastic St John the Baptiste church at Danbury. Three were so many beautiful examples, I just wanted to share some more of them with everyone. There was so much to see at this interesting church, I hope my recent blogs have sparked an interest in people and a desire to visit St John the Baptiste church at Danbury. Enjoy.

This week we are back at the church of St John the Baptiste at Danbury. Here are just a small selection from the many surviving medieval bench ends carvings from the church at Danbury. As can be seen the church of St John the Baptiste at Danbury boasts a wealth of intricately carved medieval bench ends depicting an array of designs, from biblical scenes to mythical creatures. These carvings which date back to the 13^th Century and offer a glimpse into the cultural and religious symbolism of the era. They include a number of recognizable animals like an Owl, Squirrel, lion, and a monkey, along with a number of mythical beasts including gryphons and dragons. They are frequently humorous in the intention and execution, clearly the medieval carvers had a laugh whilst creating them and were not shy in poking fun at the clergy. I would highly recommend a visit to the church of St John the Baptiste at Danbury for all history lovers, there is so much to see, it is a real gem.