Christ Church in 1991
It is ten years since Christ Church closed its doors as an active Church of Ireland parish, and it would have been much longer had its last incumbent, Rev Niall Bayly, not been so determined to keep the church open in the face of creeping dry rot, a shrinking congregation, and total lack of support from his superiors. As it was, the building was put on the market and attracted very little interest in a difficult part of the city which was still the target of bombs and vandalism. Sure enough, it was regularly broken into and entered into physical decline.
Christ Church lying derelict in 1999
Then in January 1996 it was gutted in an arson attack and became four walls and some charred roof trusses. The Church pushed for listed building consent for demolition, one member saying "If the building was taken down, at least we would have our wonderful memories." Fortunately, the DoE stuck to its ground and consent was refused. The building was bought by Inst, with the intention of pulling it down and building a sports hall on the site.
However, a good fairy was in the vicinity. When the Belfast Building Preservation Trust was set up about that time it announced that it had two buildings in mind that it wanted to see restored: St Patricks Schools in Donegall Street, which had just been gutted by fire and faced demolition; and Christ Church, which was from a different persuasion but in exactly the same plight. The BBPT's then Chairman, Fionnuala Jay-O'Boyle, embarked on a series of negotiations of Kissinger-like proportions, and once St Patrick's had been rescued she turned to Inst and Christ Church. Eventually the school was persuaded to lease the building to BBPT to enable the trust to make an application to the Heritage Lottery Fund, and the restored building is now a Centre of IT Excellence for the school and for the public. The UAHS and BBPT jointly celebrated the restoration with a lecture in the building by the Scottish conservation architect James Simpson in April 2003.
Christ Church restored in 2003
What was so difficult about the restoration?
For a start, persuading Inst that they could
use the old building and did not need to pull it down; then raising
the funding for it. But more specifically, the building had been
a shell for a number of years and there was little evidence of
its former glories from which to restore it. The charred timbers
remaining of the old trusses and galleries were removed to reveal
a plain brick shell with some structural problems. 
Extensive underpinning
was required before restoration could begin. Late in the day,
excellent photographs of the interior were located and it was
decided to restore the magnificent timber ceiling from them. 
Another late discovery was that the windows latterly on the building
were not original, a very early photograph showing small pane
cast iron windows; and again the decision was taken to restore
them. Once the roof was back on there was extensive M&E work
in installing heating, ventilation and computer wiring. 
The stonework on the portico
was in poor order and considerable restoration was involved there,
while an internal cantilevered stone staircase 
had to be extensively rebuilt.
Amongst the final touches was getting back the bas relief of Lady
Lanyon, who used to worship at Christ Church, and restoring the
marble frame to it.
Finally, this is a conversion rather than a restoration - it is no longer the massive open space it once was, since a floor has been inserted at gallery level to make the ground floor into classrooms and seminar rooms, but by way of compensation you are closer to the new pitch pine ceiling, and the new use for the building means it will be used daily by many more people than in recent years. And what has been lost from the original design has been more than compensated for by the survival of another of Belfast's architectural gems that was about to be sacrificed to the bulldozer.
The architects for the restoration of Christ Church were Consarc Design Group (Dawson Stelfox and Roisin Donnelly), and the main contractors Martin & Hamilton of Ballymena.
What is the Belfast Building Preservation Trust?
It is one of the half dozen charitable building preservation trusts that now exist in Northern Ireland. These are all members of the UK Association of Building Preservation Trusts (APT) and often obtain loan funding from the Architectural Heritage Fund, which exists to assist such bodies. BPTs are managed by voluntary committees although some have full-time employees. Some are set up to restore a specific building, others act as "revolving funds" which move their capital from each completed project into new ruins. Having successfully completed its two target projects, BBPT is looking at other buildings at risk in the Belfast area.
BBPT's current committee consists of: Fionnuala Jay O'Boyle (Patron); Paul Miller (Chairman); Peter Huggins (Secretary); Charles McMurray (Treasurer); and John Bryson, Hilary Gault, Daniel MacRandal and Marcus Patton.
Entry on Christ Church in the UAHS Central Belfast Gazetteer:
Christ Church:
1833, by William Farrell for Rev Dr Thomas Drew: Plain but dignified
Greek Revival Church of Ireland building with weathered beige
sandstone facade to College Square, consisting of a square portico
set forward from the main wall, with Ionic columns flanking the
lugged and pedimented entrance door; dark red brick sides with
arched recesses for margin-paned windows; good tall iron railing
with plain spikes rising from florations above the rail, set on
a stone coping. 
Interior
with pine ceiling and "weird and impressive" (Brett)
three-decker pine pulpit 
of
1878 by William Batt (most of the service was conducted from the
"lower deck", but the minister would ascend to the top
to deliver his sermon). The E window of c.1870 is by Samuel Evans
of Birmingham. Christ Church was built as a "free church"
to accommodate members of the Church of Ireland who could not
afford to rent pews - St Anne's and St George's had seats for
only six poor people, yet there were over 16,000 nominal members
of the Church of Ireland in Belfast at that time - and many of
its early parishioners were farmers living in the nearby countryside.
It has survived at least eleven bombs in the vicinity, but is
most at threat from the declining size of its loyal congregation
and the rationale of Church authorities with little interest in
fine buildings. [Its closure in June 1993 has just taken place].
See Brett p.23; BT 10 Feb 1978, 21 Jun 1993; Budge & O'Leary
p.97; IB 1878 p.358; IBT p.13; Larmour p.8; J F MacNeice, the
Church of Ireland in Belfast, 1931, p.11; UAHS 1991 p.13; information
from Colin Hatrick.
See also Heritage Review No.1 (1998).
PS:
Did you notice the building to the left of
Christ Church in the 1991 photograph at the top? Conservation
in Belfast always seems to take a step back for every two steps
forward, and that was the sadly unlisted Whitla Medical Institute
,
then used by Inst as its music department but suddenly demolished
to make way for a brick wall. As College Square North is being
gradually restored to its former glory it seems now that it would
have been quite feasible to retain the Institute and it would
have contributed much to the streetscape, but nothing of it now
remains.
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