How a Skills Bootcamp Set Chloe Roberts on Her Heritage Path
[
18 Jun 2026 ]
Heritage buildings need tradespeople who are comfortable with lime instead of cement, lath instead of plasterboard, and decorative work that matches what was there a hundred years ago. Across the UK, that kind of know-how is getting harder to find. Chloe Roberts is a good example of someone going the other way. A fully funded Skills Bootcamp at South Devon College gave her the grounding to get onto a live heritage restoration site and she has spent the months since building up exactly the kind of traditional skills the sector is short of.
Chloe’s site is Paignton Picture House on Victoria Street, one of the oldest surviving purpose-built cinemas in the country and a grade II listed building. It’s now being fully restored, which calls for people willing to learn traditional methods.
Much of the building is lath and plaster, a method that is uncommon but one that’s essential for keeping historic interiors intact.
“It entails mixing the lime plaster up and will involve plastering onto new laths that I have helped add to the walls. I have been working on some patch repairs and some window reveals. So I’m starting to build up my experience.”
She has also helped fit the laths themselves, so she’s learning the whole build-up, from timber structure to finished surface. Earlier lime experience came from natural building volunteer projects, plus a workshop in pargetting, the heritage skill of sculpting decorative designs into plaster.
None of that would have happened without South Devon College’s Construction Skills Bootcamp. It runs for about two weeks, it’s fully funded, and it gives students a Level 2 grounding in core construction skills plus the health and safety qualification that leads to a CSCS Labourer Card, something most sites won’t let you on without. It’s part of the College’s wider, government-funded Skills Bootcamps, run with Devon County Council.
“It covered quite a few different trades: carpentry, plastering, bricklaying, concrete work, plumbing. It was also heavily weighted on the health and safety aspect because it worked towards our labouring card.”
There was also a free day built into the schedule where students could work one-to-one with the tutor on whatever they wanted to focus on. Chloe picked decorative plastering, which links straight to the work she does now.
“The tutor had also done all the trades during his lifetime, so he was a great person to answer any questions that we had. A lot of people came with personal projects that they wanted to work on, and he was really able to help with that.”
Evening versions run too, for anyone who can’t make daytime sessions – an option Chloe had used a couple of years earlier for a Level 2 site carpentry course. The bootcamp tied that knowledge together and gave her the confidence to apply for real site roles.
“I needed that boost to give me more confidence that I know all of the health and safety aspects and a bit more about the other trades I would work with. That gave me the confidence to go and apply to work at other places.”
That confidence paid off quickly. Chloe went for a chat with the assistant site manager at the Picture House, was offered a role as a site operative and labourer, and took it.
“I help the trades that are on site. I clean, I support the other tradesmen. I keep the site going bit by bit.”
Chloe Roberts
It’s a way into heritage construction that didn’t need an apprenticeship to start, just the bootcamp’s groundwork and a willingness to learn on a working site.
“You don’t need any qualifications. You just need to have the want to learn some trades. Confidence wise, it’s a good booster to push you forward. No experience necessary.”
The heritage sector is dealing with a well-known shortage of people who can do lime plastering, stonemasonry and traditional carpentry. Funded, easy-to-access courses like this one could be exactly how that gets fixed.
Interested in construction or working in the heritage sector? Details of the Construction Skills Bootcamp that Chloe completed can be found here: Construction – Skills Bootcamp
Get active at South Devon College! Come and give us a try with a free one-day guest pass. Contact us via the link to book in your free pass. Staff available on the gym desk from 4pm weekdays or 9am on Saturdays.
