When parishioners at Samford’s Sacred Heart Catholic Church arrived for worship this year, they noticed a few changes to their local parish.

The church underwent an extensive facelift over summer, designed to modernise its sacred space, just in time for the parish’s 25th anniversary celebration.

Sacred Heart priest Father Frank Lourigan said the church improvements, which included “a repaint, remodelling, reshaping, a little bit of deconstruction and a bit of reconstruction”, took about six weeks.

“We wanted to bring it (the church) up to liturgical requirements of the last 20 years of changes to the church’s understanding of how the sacrament should be celebrated and our worship space arranged,” he said.

“We spent a fair bit of last year talking to the community about it and then we brought it to a head in the latter part of the year.

“We had a couple of different designs and shapes of how it be could configured … and we’ve opted for the one that suits the community the best.”

Camp Mountain architect and long-time parishioner Grahame Shelley said the refurbishment was carried out by local suppliers and artisans and included the use of materials millions of years old.

“We had a lot of consultation with the community, and tried to use local builders and craftsmen as much as possible,” Mr Shelley said.

Highvale’s Lee Kenny was chosen specifically for his skills in handcrafting custom-made furniture through his locally based business Buywood Furniture.

“I was really surprised when Graham Shelley phoned me to ask if I’d like to be involved with the church,” Mr Kenny said.

“We custom make all of our furniture, so that wasn’t a concern, but the majority of our pieces would be classed as household furniture – so the opportunity to create these liturgical pieces was very exciting.”

Mr Kenny was commissioned to create a range of pieces, including the priest’s chair, alter, tabernacle stand, lectern and baptistry.

Among the highlights of the revamped church is a water bath at the baptistry that was carved by Neil Handfling from locally sourced volcanic rock, estimated to be more than 450 million years old.

Mr Shelley said the refurbishments had received a lot of positive feedback from churchgoers.

“We’re really happy with how everything has gone,” he said.