19/02/2026
The Chroma Conservation team were honoured to undertake conservation and restoration work in the incredible Elizabethan Hall at the Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, London.
Every ten years, a vast scaffold is erected to inspect the condition of this precious historic building — a rare opportunity to dust, repaint the walls, and carefully examine the decorative painted elements we were invited to conserve.
Our work focused on the Coat of Arms of the Middle Temple, a wall-mounted painted copper shield; the two decorative plasterwork Coats of Arms in the transept ceiling; and the charming painting of the Agnus Dei (Lamb of God), the insignia of the Inner Temple, in the cupola lantern high above the magnificent Elizabethan double hammerbeam roof constructed between 1562–1574.
Treatment included conservation cleaning, substrate repairs, stabilisation of paint layers, re-gilding, in-painting lost areas, and the complete repainting and gilding of the heavily discoloured varnished surfaces of the ceiling Coats of Arms and shield.
The Hall is steeped in history. Queen Elizabeth I visited in 1578, and the High Table is said to have been gifted by the Queen — carved from a single oak tree and floated down the River Thames from Windsor. On 2 February 1602 (Candlemas), the first recorded performance of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night took place here, commissioned by the Queen herself.
An incredible couple of weeks working within — and learning from — the remarkable history of this extraordinary London landmark.
