Progress Update - Week 2

After finishing up on the interior finishes it was time to start peeling off the outside layers. The general plan is to take the roof down to the trusses, then remove them and pull down the walls. This week we had two major goals, remove the brick from the exterior and remove the roof. Removing brick was an exercise in sledgehammers in combination with the Tele-Handler. Brad poked the brick till it popped off the façade, then we came in to break up the pieces and stack them on pallets to be moved to the collection area. When we ran out of pallets we made fire bucket lines and passed the brick to a big pile. Everyone got very good at brick throwing. For a while now we have been referring all weights in brick increments, as in “Boy this gallon of milk is about 3 bricks” or “My nephew is about a 6 brick”.

Before work began

After Week 1

Mid-Week 2

And of Week 2

Anthony and Sam after working on the roof, very dirty work.

In addition to the site work we also kicked off the design process with a visit to the Maya Lin exhibit at the Carnegie Museum of Art and did a series of material studies. It has been quite a process to move between big design ideas and specific construction methods. It’s a challenge to understand the way to construct and stay true to your design. To complete the kick-off we hosted a community meeting at Hopewell where anyone could come and share their thoughts, memories, and questions about the project. Here are some things we learned:

• Many people remember milestones of their lives (or family’s lives) in the chapel and told stories about those memories.
• milestone memories from the chapel include weddings, funerals, and Sunday school
• Several people expressed sadness that the building was being torn down, but there is general acceptance that is has to be done.
• The cemetery is shared between the Hopewell Church and Warren Township, there are about 20 burials a year, and each grave is hand dug
• Despite the low number of burials each year, the cemetery is very active. Family members regularly visit and maintain their plots.
• The new church was built because
• The old building was getting to costly to maintain - The roof started leaking and would have needed to be replaced
• Could no longer be upgraded – there is no water service to the chapel and it is impossible to get service because of the location. Further, the electrical service was removed some time ago and could not be put back in place.
• Congregation became too large – in the 70’s the congregation grew to more than 100 regular attendees, they could no longer fit in the building.

From this meeting and after discussion the functional needs of the program were determined:

• Funeral services
• Small gatherings and events
• Space for contemplation for visitors to the cemetery