AN Outwell church group is launching a social media campaign to help raise funds for urgent repairs to the building.

Friends of St Clement, the group which fund-raises on behalf of St Clement’s Church, is turning to Facebook and Twitter in an attempt to raise awareness of the church’s plight.

The group has been successful with their grant application to English Heritage but needs to part-match their funding in order to preserve the church’s unique carved demons.

They will spend £27,000 in the coming year on removing and examining the “demon” carvings.

Members of the group met at their annual general meeting to discuss ways of fund-raising for the project.

Harriet Bye, Friends of St Clement member, said: “We’ll post the word about St Clement’s and its unique features, including the locally famous demon carvings, and hopefully watch it go viral round the world,”

Fellow committee member Kate Jackson warned that great care needed to be taken with the demons.

She said: “They will have to be very careful with them because no-one knows what state they are in.

“They are very fragile, have suffered death watch beetle damage and need very special handling.”

But Mrs Jackson was hopeful the repairs would give a new lease of life to the church.

She said: “The aim is to put the church back into a sound, attractive condition, with the carvings replaced and illuminated so that we can attract lots of visitors and raise national and international awareness of this unique place,”

Spending of a further £190,000 has been approved to fund whatever repairs are needed to both the carvings and the fabric of the church to ensure there is no further damage to them.

To find out more about the church go to www.stclementsoutwell.org.uk