An impressive pipe organ with an even more impressive past has recently been located inside a Hammersmith high school. And a fundraising campaign has now been launched to help restore it to its former glory.
The school in question is Sacred Heart High School; a Catholic secondary school in west London. The historic organ was initially believed to have been an original feature of the school’s Grade II* listed chapel. But following a visit from Dr William McVicker (the curator of organs at Royal Festival Hall), it’s been revealed that the rather incredible instrument actually has a rather extraordinary back story.
McVicker inspected the instrument and suspected that it was perhaps slightly more unique than the school may have originally thought. He did a bit of digging, and discovered that the organ was, in fact, built in France by Belgian craftsman, Hippolyte Loret, and smuggled from Paris to London over 100 years ago.
The research revealed that the Society of Sacred Heart in France had commissioned Loret to build the organ for one of its schools in Paris over 160 years ago. When convents across the country started to close, Mother Mabel Digby (who was the superior general of the society at the time) had the instrument dismantled, packaged up, and shipped over to London to avoid it being confiscated by the French government.
In 1904, the organ arrived in Hammersmith and was reassembled inside the chapel at Sacred Heart. And the school are now eager to give the instrument some well-deserved TLC to restore it to its former glory so it can be used for concerts and recitals. The school believes it to be their responsibility to save the previously-neglected organ, and do Mother Mabel Digby proud.
The careful restoration will be conducted by a specialist firm, and will involve dismantling and removing the organ from the school before reinstalling it. A fundraiser has recently been launched, and Sacred Heart High School are aiming to raise (a rather eye-watering) £257,000 to save the historic instrument. Blimey.
You can donate towards the repair and restoration of Sacred Heart’s Loret organ here.