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Rideau Street Convent Chapel

Rideau Street Convent Chapel, (c1880)

National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario
 

Site manager for conservation and preparations for installation of late nineteenth century poly-chromed wood church ceiling, windows and interior fittings in the new National Gallery, Ottawa. Church interior had been hastily disassembled years before so process involved determining in what order the pieces originally fit and then developing techniques to stabilize, clean and fasten components together. Various techniques also developed to hide saw cut damage, repair splits, infill missing components, etc. With Commonwealth Historic Resource Management Limited.

  

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The wood ceiling as it appeared before the convent was demolished in 1972.

  

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Like a giant jig-saw puzzle the first steps involved determining how the pieces fit together.

  

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In 1985 Dennis Carr and I undertaking a trial fit of the disassembled ceiling components.