Shroud now covers Shire Hall

Shire Hall is covered in a four metre and seven metre high shroud covered in characters that represent the story of Monmouth town.

The shroud was installed this month (11.03.09) as a way of making the building more attractive whilst important restoration works are carried out.

The building is also surrounded by hoarding that shows life size people looking up at the shroud as part of the Shire Hall project team's s efforts to attract visitors to the top half of town.

Debbie McCarty of Monmouth's One Stop Shop is part of the Shire Hall project team.  She explained:

"The scaffolding on the building doesn't show the building in the best light so we decided to ask people in the town for ideas on how we could help the building to keep attracting people.

"We want to help the retailers in Monmouth by keeping visitor numbers high.

"A designer from local practice Platform One approached us with a wonderful idea for a shroud that not only shows characters from the history of our town, but he also suggested that we get the community and visitors involved by making it a competition.

"There are 64 characters on the shroud representing trades, historical figures and people important to the story of Monmouth. They are in two rows and are depicted in alphabetical order so the character on the far left is called something beginning with ‘A'. An example might be someone with a paintbrush and palette, your answer would be ‘artist'.

By identifying what each one is and completing an entry form available from a number of Monmouth's shops, there is an opportunity to win £500 for the most correct identification, with £300 and £200 respectively for 2nd and 3rd places.  The competition runs until January 2010.

David Evans, of Monmouth based firm, Platform One, said:

"The characters were researched and drawn by Platform One, then we produced and despatched artwork to a specialist company in Cambridgeshire, who printed the large banners and arranged their installation,"

The designers waived part of their fee in order to make the exercise financially viable.

As well as the banners, Platform One designed the life-size characters around the perimeter hoarding: they are reading interesting facts about the Shire Hall.  Another Monmouth company, Chillipepper Signs, was engaged to produce and fit all these cut-outs, some of which are recognisable as local people.

The shroud has now been fitted despite recent delays to the project - contractors have been unable to erect scaffold in Beaufort Square because the landowners are refusing to give their consent for them to continue.

Council officers are aiming to do continue restore as much as they can while the dispute continues.

Bob Greenland, cabinet member for regeneration at Monmouthshire County Council, said:

"Shire Hall is a public building, and we are using public funds for public benefit. I hope that the company see reason and allow us to get on with restoring this historic building for our community."