The Friends' working party at Vizovice in Moravia, September 2018

The project that we undertook at the Château of Vizovice in the week 8 - 15 September consisted of taking down an unstable brick boundary wall in the park, which had been rebuilt before the Velvet Revolution. It was set on a stone base, which had also collapsed in places. We cleaned all the bricks ready for reuse and rebuilt sections of the stone base ready for the brick wall to be rebuilt by professionals. We had excellent supervision from Filip Trunečka, a very skilled conservation plasterer with a great knowledge of the use of lime. The importance of the project was that we were a volunteer group working on part of a historic site owned by the Czech National Heritage Instutute (NPÚ).

The château manager Jana Pluharová and colleagues from the Czech National Heritage Instutute (NPÚ) all helped to make our week a very enjoyable one. We were lucky that there was an excellent coffee shop in the château, which provided a quality respite. On our day off we had an extremely interesting tour of the city of Zlín and visited the Bat'a museum, the administration building, a typical worker's house, and much else besides belonging to the global shoemaker, whose beginnings were in the city.

We also had a tour of the slivovitz (fruit brandy made from damson plums) factory in Vizovice. Fortunately we were not expected to return to work after the visit. Needless to say we found some very convivial places to enjoy dinner and a drink in the evening.

Images from the top, copyright Radek Linner, remaining two by Robin Lawrie