Boston Flora

Tag: Mark Newman

  • Tuesday, October 17, 5:00 am – 6:30 am Eastern (but recorded) – Studley Royal Park, Online

    The Gardens Trust has created a seven part series on Tuesdays, beginning September 12, to mark 50 years of UNESCO World Heritage, £5 each or all 7 for £28. Starting with an overview of World Heritage values and the changing nature of the UK list, the series will aim to enthuse people about individual sites around Great Britain, highlighting what makes each one exceptional, the advantages and challenges of being inscribed on the list, and the issues around sustainable future management of these global assets. Attendees will be sent a Zoom link 2 days prior to the start of the talk, and again a few hours before the talk. A link to the recorded session (available for 1 week) will be sent shortly afterwards. Register for the complete series HERE, or follow the links on that page to sign up for individual sessions.

    Week Six covers Studley Royal Park. Studley Royal Park, including the ruins of Fountains Abbey, became one of the first places in the UK to be named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1986. It owes its originality and striking beauty to the fact that a humanized landscape was created around the largest medieval ruins in the United Kingdom. The use of these features, combined with the planning of the water garden itself, is a true masterpiece of human creative genius. The water garden is one of the few great 18th-century gardens to have survived well in its original form.

    The ruins of Fountains Abbey, the Jacobean Fountains Hall and Burges’s miniature neo-Gothic masterpiece St Mary’s Church unite with the water gardens and deer park to form one harmonious whole. Together, they illustrate the power of medieval monasticism and the taste and wealth of the European upper classes in the 18th century.

    Mark Newman MA MCIfA FSA has been the National Trust’s Archaeologist since 1988. A graduate of Birmingham University, he provides archaeological advice and support to around 75 NT properties in Yorkshire and the North-East. He is author of Wonder of the North (NT/Boydell, 2015), a definitive history of the estate (and is working on a new edition).

    Sarah France has been World Heritage Coordinator at Fountains Abbey and Studley Royal since 2010. Before that Sarah spent almost 20 years working in planning and heritage for National Parks across the UK. Her current role is to coordinate delivery of the World Heritage Management Plan and deliver conservation projects. Recently she worked with Nidderdale AONB and other partners to develop the Skell Valley Project and the successful bid to the National Lottery Heritage Fund for a £1.4m grant.

  • Tuesday, May 4, 5:00 am – 6:30 am – Seaton Delaval Hall, a Curtain Rises, Online

    Seaton Delaval Hall, near Blyth in Northumberland, long famed as the northern exemplar of Sir John Vanbrugh’s ‘castle style’ mansions, was acquired by the National Trust (with unparalleled local community fundraising support) in 2009. The most recent and largest program of National Lottery Heritage Fund-supported conservation works, the “Curtain Rises” project, is just coming to a crescendo including important restoration of the gardened grounds around the hall. This work has been based on over five year’s archaeological research designed to understand the hall’s original gardens more completely and identify where its archaeological remains survive so that they can be effectively protected. The result is a complete redrawing of the understanding of the C18 landscape design, its authors, and the extent of the Northumberland landscape it encompassed.

    A ticket for this individual session costs £5, and you may purchase tickets through Eventbrite via the link here.

    Mark Newman M.A., M.C.I.f.A, F.S.A., is the National Trust’s Archaeological Consultant for the east side of its North region, helping to advise and support the conservation of National Trust properties between Berwick and the boundaries of Great Manchester. He was first employed by the Trust on the project building the visitor centre at Fountains Abbey and Studley Royal in 1988 and has advised (as well as avidly explored) the property ever since. Mark’s work for the National Trust covers an enormous range of development and research projects spread across approximately 75 properties, many concerned with the archaeology of parks and gardens. The long-term perspective of the organization sets the scene for developing an exceptionally curious and accumulative research approach, put to full use in advising conservation.