The churches welcoming happy 'champers' and bar-goers

Keen campers are being invited to find sanctuary in a rural church as guardians look for a variety of ways to boost the coffers.

Champing, as it has been dubbed, is one approach being used in Norfolk to preserve well-loved but under-utilised and costly church buildings, with others becoming cafes, bars, arts and antique centres.

The medieval St Peter's Church in Hockwold cum Wilton, near Thetford, is welcoming the campers, with the Churches Conservation Trust saying its visitors "find it a really unique experience".

Meanwhile, at the Grade I-listed St Michael at Plea Church in Norwich city centre, a piano and jazz bar has just opened to a "good reception", according to operator John Taylor.

Kate Roma, from the Churches Conservation Trust in Norfolk and North Suffolk, which cares for St Peter's, said it was important the ancient buildings continued to attract people through the doors to safeguard their futures.

St Peter's dates back to the 14th Century and is no longer open for worship, but its Grade I listing meant it needed to be maintained.

Roma said fewer sightseers now carried cash, resulting in a drop in donations collected in wall safes and tins.

"In Norfolk we have over 700 medieval churches - a very limited amount of those now are used for regular Sunday worship or worship at all, and we don't want to lose our heritage," she said.

"We need to keep our churches going and [they] cost a lot of money.

"Hockwold, for example, costs around £8,000 a year in maintenance and that's before you even tackle the repairs, which are standing at around £50,000."

She continued that churches were intertwined with people's family history through baptisms, weddings and funerals so it was doubly important to keep the churches open and used.

St Peter's is believed to be one of at least two churches across the county where visitors can now camp overnight, with the accommodation seemingly hitting the right chord.

"Imagine the door shut at night and seeing the beautiful historic architecture and... art before you," said Roma.

For Taylor, the chance to turn the medieval St Michael at Plea into The Church piano bar meant the walls will reverberate to the sounds of instruments once more.

"How many places can you see somebody at a grand piano or a lute or a harp player, so I just wanted to give a platform to those kinds of lesser featured instruments and musicians," he said.

Although the Redwell Street venue closed as a church in 1971, Taylor said its former religious use meant it was not the most obvious place to convert into a bar.

Its Grade I status had also made the revamp more difficult, but "these buildings were built for music and community", he said.

He added it had been "a real pleasure" to bring the building back into use and get people back through the doors again.

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