Restoring Stonehenge: securing a Neolithic monument over 120 years

Visitors to Stonehenge in September may have noticed a strikingly modern addition to the Neolithic monument: a mobile scaffolding tower. This autumn has seen one of the most significant conservation projects to take place at the site in more than six decades, aimed at securing the stones against erosion as well as undoing some of the effects of well-intentioned but ultimately damaging repairs carried out more than half a century earlier. The recent conservation works stemmed from two previous pieces of research: a laser survey of the monument, and a detailed engineer’s report. The former initiative saw high-resolution scans undertaken in 2012, during the first comprehensive laser survey