Sutton House Society Newsletter
June 2003
For all interested in the past, present and future of Sutton House
In this newsletter:
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Please join us for our visit to the Stour Valley on Sunday 13th July. The theme this year will be two English artists: John Constable (1776–1837) and Sir Alfred Munnings (1878–1959).
We shall leave from outside the front of Sutton House at 10am and drive to Dedham village. There we shall view the fine 15th-century church, which has associations with the Pilgrim Fathers and Massachusetts. This will be followed by a short walk in the neighbouring village of East Bergholt, which will include the site of Constable’s house and the home of Vicar Rudd, who for seven years obstructed the painter’s marriage.
We shall stop for lunch at Bridge Cottage (N.T.) near Flatford Mill, where there is an exhibition about Constable’s life and work.
In the afternoon we shall return to Dedham to visit the Castle House Museum. This is the former home of Sir Alfred Munnings (P.R.A.) and contains many of his works. Munnings is best remembered today as a fashionable Society painter of racehorses, but this visit will also provide an opportunity to see a good selection of his earlier works, which record a wide variety of scenes from English rural life.
After this we shall drive back through some of the villages painted by Constable, finishing at Hadleigh, where we can view the old Guildhall.
The cost per person (including admission to Castle House) will be £10 for members of the Society and £15 for non-members. To book please call Sutton House on 020-8525 9055 or 020-8525 9054, or fill in the attached form and send it to Sutton House. To ensure that your booking is confirmed please pay the full amount in advance: there are only 14 seats on the minibus, so hurry!
The National Trust’s newly acquired Red House in Bexleyheath will open to the public on 16th July. Commissioned by William Morris and designed by Philip Webb, two of the founders of the Arts and Crafts movement, the house is a landmark in the history of domestic architecture and the garden inspired Morris’ early designs of wallpaper and fabric. It was completed in 1859. Morris lived there with his wife Jane for five years.
Red House was designed to express a set of social, architectural and cultural values drawn from history. It was Webb’s first private commission and with its garden was planned as a single entity. Morris believed that the garden should "clothe" the house, linking it with the countryside which then surrounded it. The house was constructed of warm red brick, under a steep red-tiled roof, with an emphasis on natural materials. The sense of space and light was a radical departure from the high-Victorian style of the day and much of the interior was decorated by Morris and Webb with Rossetti and Burne-Jones.
All visits to the Red House must be pre-booked. The house is open from 16th July, Wednesday to Sunday 11am to 5pm, last entry 4.15pm. Guided tours for 12 people (max.) will run every 45 minutes. Admission is £5 adults, £2.50 children, £12.50 family, free to N.T. members. Please call the N.T. booking line on 01494 755 588 if you would like to make a booking. The booking line is open 9.30am to 4pm Monday to Friday.
Sutton House has hosted several factfinding visits from new regional and national Trust staff, who appreciate the learning and community work we do. We are keen to develop as a Centre of Excellence for the Trust in terms of learning.
Siân Harrington
Sunday 29th June:
Keeping up Tudor Appearances.
Tudor men wore tights and women put lead on their faces. Take part in this fashion frenzy and discover how important it was to have the right look.
Sunday 27th July:
It’s a Kid’s Life.
Come and enjoy yourself on this day of adventure where the fun and games of children from the past come to life.
A series of special days where visitors are invited to capture Sutton House through the use of a wide range of art materials. Throughout the day assistance will be available from a professional artist. Art materials and tutor are free after paying for entry to the house. 12.30pm to 5pm on the following Sundays: 8th June (watercolour and pencil), 6th July (pen, ink, pencil and pastel), 3rd August (mixed media, pastel and pencil), 7th September (pastel, pencil and watercolour).
Every Friday from 2pm to 4pm entry to the house is free to Hackney elders. If you are over 55 please drop in for a guided tour, a reminiscence session, an art-and-craft class or a talk. The project will culminate in an exhibition in the Gallery in July. Call Mary Colson, Education Officer, on 020-8525 9057 for further information.
4th June to 6th July: Phyllis Goodman and Audrey Hailey: The View from Here. Two local water-colourists are bringing their latest paintings to Sutton House, following a successful first year of exhibitions at Bethnal Green, Bow, South Quays and Whitechapel.
9th July to 3rd August: Elders Reminiscence Show. Every Friday afternoon local elders have come together at Sutton House to create this inspirational multi-media insight into times gone by.
Saturday 19th July: A Nursery of Riot. Mike Gray reveals the story of Hackney House. Built for a governor of the Bank of England in 1723, it became a college for Protestant dissenters by the end of the century where radicals like Joseph Priestley taught and students invited Tom Paine to speak. Talk starts at 11.00am. Admission is £5 including coffee.
Sunday 1st June: Sutton House Free Guided Tours. At 2pm and 4pm on the first Sunday of every month, these tours bring to life the architectural changes at Sutton House, exploring the stories of the many different occupants, their social aspirations, and the changing face of Hackney.
Sunday 15th June 5pm: The Fitzwilliam String Quartet with Penelope Roskell (piano) play Rosetti, Brahms and Shostakovich. Tickets £8.00 adult, £5.00 concessions. Box office 01494-755 572. This is the final concert in the current series by the Sutton House Music Society. The 2003–4 programme will be launched later this summer.
Jim and Florence Davy were two of the earliest supporters of the Sutton House campaign and generous in our first appeal for its restoration. So it is with great sadness that we have to record Jim’s recent death and send all our best wishes to Florence who at 90+ is still a keen supporter. When Jim’s brother died he very generously donated £5,000 from his estate to the Sutton House campaign. On a very, very cold day in November, when the house was still awaiting its renaissance but looked like Aladdin’s cave because the second Craft Fair was underway, I met Jim and Florence and gratefully received their cheque. Although residents of Theydon Bois for many years, they had been Hackney folk for most of their lives with Florence being elected a local Labour councillor before WW2! They never forgot the Hackney of their youth, their optimism for change and the struggles that were to mark the postwar years. Sutton House — the campaign for its repair, membership of the Society, the appeal to fund its new life and then visits when it was re-opened — provided a very tangible link with their past. Jim was quiet and strong, in contrast to Florence’s bubbly personality and they were always a joy to meet. As Florence is housebound these days, as well as sending our sympathy for her loss, we send our good wishes for her health and thanks to both for their lifelong concern for Hackney.
Carole Mills
Sutton House, 2&4 Homerton High Street, Hackney, London, E9 6JQ. Tel: 020-8986 2264
National Trust website:
http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk
Sutton House Society website:
http://welcome.to/SuttonHouse