ECHINUS STONE ACADEMY - Key Persons

Job Titles:

• As Master

As Master Mason, Stephen ran projects in and around Gloucestershire and Oxfordshire including: Heythrop House, Wheatley Park, The YMCA, Cheltenham and a variety of Regency houses in Cheltenham. While working at Stoneleigh Abbey in 1999, he supervised the masonry and conservation packages of both phase I and phase II to their successful completion. The work consisted of the conservation and restoration of the 14th century gatehouse, garden balustrade, Charlesworthy Bridge and Victorian conservatory. Different degrees of intervention were used for each of the works packages, recognising the individual historic properties of each structure. Whilst working for a number of specialist conservation companies as a freelance Master Mason and Contracts Manager from the early 2000's, he ran projects such as the Conservation of the Piers Cloakroom and Westminster Hall at The Palace of Westminster, Windsor Castle, Lancing College Chapel, The Doge's Palace, Venice, Somerset House and worked on the Great Court project at The British Museum. Bertholey House was built by George Maddox, a pupil of John Soane. In the early 1900's it was razed to the ground over a family dispute and stood completely ruined and with no front elevation until 2000. Stephen was asked to form and lead a small team of craftspeople and, with only two drawings and a few very early photographs, rebuild it to its former glory. To comply with the client's wishes, all replacement stone was worked on-site including an entire front elevation cornice, portico columns and Ionic capitals. Since 2006 Stephen has worked with The Guild of Masters running a department overseeing craft training in thirteen countries. He is also the Guild Master of The Stonemasons' Guild of St. Stephen and St. George as well as working commercially at the highest levels internationally. Years of working so closely with high quality design and craftsmanship especially from the 17th 18th and early 19th Centuries lead to Stephen gaining a deep understanding of the design of these periods and he is now one of very few craftspeople worldwide who still works with the techniques and visual proportions contemporary to these times, many of which, closely link with the explosion of baroque music through harmonic proportion. Over a long career, Stephen has worked on many projects, below are those he considers notable.