Heritage Scaffolding for The Old Bank Arts and Enterprise Centre, Millom

Total Access Scaffolding is proud to be providing scaffolding for one of the most significant building projects in Millom’s recent history. The Old Bank — the former NatWest building on Market Square, vacant since 2017 — is being transformed into a vibrant Arts and Enterprise Centre as part of the £29.3 million Millom Town Deal. This flagship regeneration project is breathing new life into a prominent heritage building at the heart of our home town.

The conversion, delivered by Story Contracting Limited as principal contractor, is creating a hub for local businesses, start-ups and the community. The finished centre will include a café and exhibition space, co-working areas, maker and workshop spaces, and start-up enterprise facilities — all housed within the carefully restored fabric of this distinctive Market Square landmark. As a Millom-based business ourselves, this project has particular significance for our team. It represents the kind of investment in our town that we’ve always believed in, and delivering the heritage scaffolding for such a high-profile local project is genuinely rewarding.

The Old Bank required a comprehensive scaffold package covering multiple phases of the conversion programme. We designed and erected independent scaffolding to all external elevations of the building, providing the principal contractor’s team with full access for stone cleaning, repointing, window restoration and roof repairs across the entire heritage facade.

Given the building’s prominent Market Square location and the public interest in the Town Deal project, pedestrian management was critical from day one. We installed protective canopies along the public footpath frontages to maintain safe pedestrian access around the building throughout the works. Internal birdcage scaffolding was provided for the first-floor ceiling restoration and structural beam work, while structural support scaffolding was deployed during critical phases of the internal remodelling where load-bearing elements were being altered to create the new open-plan enterprise spaces. The scaffold configuration was adapted multiple times across the programme as different trades required access to different areas and heights.

Market Square is the civic and commercial centre of Millom, with the building directly adjacent to the town’s main public space. The scaffold had to accommodate market days, community events and the daily flow of pedestrians and vehicles around the square without compromising public safety or access to neighbouring businesses. We coordinated scaffold erection and major adaptations around the square’s event calendar and maintained constant communication with the Town Deal project team and Cumberland Council throughout.

The heritage fabric of the building demanded careful scaffold engineering at every contact point. The original stonework, decorative features and banking-era architectural details required non-marking protective fittings, carefully planned tie positions and scaffold designs that avoided loading any fragile or historically significant elements. As a project funded through the Government’s Town Deal programme, full CDM-compliant documentation was required — method statements, risk assessments, scaffold design calculations, inspection certificates and photographic records were all provided to the principal contractor’s standards. Working on a project of this scale and significance in our own town, just metres from our office at the South Cumbria Skills Exchange on Devonshire Road, has been a source of genuine pride for every member of our team.