What’s next after the devastating fire with SK8 Liborius?

ST. LOUIS – An inventory of what is still standing. Members of the skate community conducted an engineering survey of the burned-out remains of an old Catholic church converted into a skate park.

On June 28, a fire in the parish kitchen of the former St. Liborius’ Church spread embers to the roof and caused extensive damage to the neighborhood’s landmark, St. Louis Place.

“Last year we put a whole new roof on the tower there and it took a long time to burn off,” said Bryan Bedwell, co-founder of SK8 Liborius.

This community of artists and skateboarders that make up Liborius Urban Art Studios say their nonprofit organization wants to try to salvage what they created.

“We hired a company — an SSC engineering and architectural firm,” Bedwell said. “We also work with B3 Studios, another architecture firm here in St. Louis, and they’re trying to help us evaluate what we can save and keep. We have to figure out how to go from here and we have to have a starting place. They will help us find that starting point.”

The nonprofit organization will host a Halloween fundraiser at the St. Louis Skatium. Before that they will be at Music at the Intersection selling t-shirts and bricks from the old church to help rebuild.

Chris Grindz, LUAS board member and skateboarder, hopes the engineers and architects bring good news.

“I’m pretty sure if it’s structurally strong enough to build a shell around the bricks, we should be able to build something pretty solid,” Grindz said.