St Andrew's Thornhill Square Fundraising consultant - Cloudesley

Case Study

St Andrew’s Thornhill Square Fundraising consultant

Church	St Andrew’s Church, Thornhill Square, N1 1BQ
Designation	Grade II listed
Total project cost	£30,000
Cloudesley grants	Autumn 2022: £30,000
Dates	February 2023: Consultant engaged September 2024: Work finished
Contractors used	BR!L
Background	St Andrew’s Thornhill Square is on the national Heritage At Risk Register in the top category of concern. Its condition is officially ‘very bad’. St Andrew’s needed to embark on a multi-million pound restoration and renewal project to address these issues. Serious structural issues with the building (particularly the condition of the tower and spire and the effects of structural cracks affecting many parts of the building) needed addressing and the potential of the interior space needed to be optimised. The PCC decided to procure the services of a Fundraising and Project Management Consultant to develop the project to the point of First Round application to the National Heritage Lottery Fund (NLHF), develop a Fundraising Strategy and set out the potential for a local fundraising campaign. The project has been successful overall. The parish gained £95k in resilience funding from the National Lottery Heritage Fund. This funding will make the church ‘project ready’ for the next stage in their plans. It is funding a Project Development Manager, Community Engagement Practitioner, Creative Practitioner, Business Planning Consultant, Fundraising Consultant and design team. This is giving hope to the church and wider local community that they will be able to tackle the problems of the church building. The initial project also helped with their bid to the National Churches Trust, which enabled the parish to get £5k in funding for the North Vestry Gable works.
Benefits	The parish gained £95k in resilience funding from the National Lottery Heritage Fund and £5k from the National Churches Trust. The latter, in addition to Cloudesley funding, enabled the works to the North Vestry Gable to be completed. These are the first permanent repairs to be undertaken as part of this large project. This project was completed on time and within budget. This has given confidence for the second area of permanent repairs (to the west elevation) to be started in spring 2025. The project is thus gaining momentum, which is having a positive effect on the congregation and local community, as well as on the state of the church building.
Challenges	The initial Expression of Interest to the National Lottery Heritage Fund was not successful. A learning point is that the standard for applications has risen over the years and that in order to be successful the quality of submission needs to be very high and issues thought through and developed further than once was the case. There do not seem to be many consultancies that can give the full range of advice that is required in this situation. However, having a range of disparate consultants would be harder to manage.
Top tips for other churches	Try to identify skilled and committed people in the congregation who can support the Incumbent (Vicar/Rector) in overseeing the project. Liaise effectively with the Diocese about strategy and permissions for works. Be persistent.
The Cloudesley perspective – why did this project gain support?	With a multi-million pound restoration project required, St Andrew’s have a mammoth fundraising task ahead of them. Engaging a professional consultant to come up with a fundraising plan and prepare critical funding applications seemed a crucial step to securing the funds needed to ensure the building’s future. St Andrew’s had clearly defined objectives for the Consultant which meant they could make the best use of the consultancy and be left with useful resources for the fundraising campaign once the consultancy came to an end.