The Vestibule

For a century a wooden lobby stood inside the west door, hiding the arch behind it. The Friends paid for the oak and glass vestibule that replaced it, so the arch can be seen again.

about this project

From Darkness into Light

The west door is the way the cathedral was meant to be entered. For most of the last century it was not the way most people got in.

Inside it stood a wooden lobby, put there in the early 1900s, which kept the weather out and everything else with it. It hid the stone arch of the doorway. It made the entrance dark. And the slope up from Palace Road, together with the step at the threshold, meant that anyone who could not manage steps came in by a narrow side door instead.

The stone arch of the west doorway, uncovered after the early-1900s wooden lobby was taken down — The stone arch, uncovered after the old lobby came down

The Society paid for that to change. Orkney Islands Council put the proposals out to public consultation in July 2019, and recorded that the cost of the work would be met mainly by the Friends.

The design came from Andrew Boyce of Ferrey and Mennim, the cathedral architects. The new vestibule is oak and glass on a steel frame, with a curved roof shaped to follow the line of the stone arch it stands beneath, so that the arch is visible again for the first time in a hundred years. Its central doors open onto the central aisle, which matters at a wedding or a funeral, and when the outer doors are open there is a clear view from one end of the building to the other.

Outside, the ground was re-graded so that the threshold is level with the floor inside. Eroded sandstone around the door was replaced with stone from the Head of Holland, the same quarry the cathedral was built from in the twelfth century.

“The craftmanship is outstanding and we now have an addition which befits this treasured building loved by so many near and far."
Elaine Grieve, Chair of the Society of The Friends of St Magnus Cathedral

It was built by Casey Construction of Orkney. The old lobby was taken down by hand, under archaeological supervision. The stonework was pointed in lime mortar, and reclaimed tiles were laid around the perimeter. As part of the same works, the west window above the door was cleaned inside and out and a damaged pane repaired, by Rainbow Glass Studios of Prestwick.

The work was finished in January 2022, and on 5 April the main doors were unlocked for the first time in two years, having been shut for the pandemic as well as the building work. On Palm Sunday the vestibule was dedicated by Lord Wallace of Tankerness, then Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, with a blessing from the Rev Fraser Macnaughton.

The work

Years the west door stood closed, 2020 to 2022

Years the wooden lobby stood inside the west door before it was replaced

PHOTOGRAPHS

15 IMAGES – CLICK TO ENLARGE