The first phase of the Trumau Byzantine Chapel project at the ITI has already been completed. Our architect donated the first plans and our students did almost all of the work of this phase. They cleared the space, removed the un-needed walls to reveal the original arches and helped a local firm to level the dirt floor. We are now in the middle of the second and third phases.
The base concrete floor has been completed and the walls have been added to delineate the chapel space and create the sacristy and utility rooms.
In September 2013, the ceiling was plastered with careful precision to keep the lines of the original arches.
We installed the floor heating, electricity and plumbing. Then the second plastering coat was applied to the ceilings and sanded by hand, as this coating served as the base coat for the iconography.
While the ceiling preparation was in process, we hired two iconographers, Br. Ioan Gotia, dcjm, from Romania, and Fr. Tomas Labanic, from Slovakia to begin their artistic work. Both are graduates of the ITI. Fr. Tomas Labanic will work from home and do iconography on panels for the walls of the chapel. Br. Gotia first made sketches from home for the iconographic work he will do on the ceiling.
Br. Gotia arrived at the ITI in January 2014 and the first fruit of all this preparation can now be seen in the icons he is writing in the chapel. He will remain at the ITI for six months to complete the ceiling iconography.
Once the heating and electricity was installed, we were able to begin using the chapel regularly for Vespers, and recently had a Mass there to celebrate the visit of one of our graduates who was just ordained a deacon.