Richard and Sonia in the gardensDay one of the residency and we’ve been trying to get to grips with what we are doing.
As National Trust houses go, Wightwick Manor isn’t very old – it was built new in the late 19th century; built looking old but full of mod cons, like electricity and central heating. This makes its history for a project like this quite recent, which makes chance encounters like today’s all the more interesting.
A wedding was scheduled in the house at 12, so we (Sonia, Richard and me) only had time for a quick look at the rooms we are going to work in before the wedding party arrived.
As we were coming out of the drawing room we were passed by two women, who I assumed must be NT volunteers, and I asked them a casual question about a photo on one of the sides.
“Oh, that’s Anthea – our half-sister”
By accident we had fallen into conversation with two of the members of the Mander family, the original occupants and builders of the house.
What followed was a series of stories and anecdotes about the family, what the house was like when they were children & their mother (an extraordinary woman – expelled from four boarding schools, arrested in Piccadilly Circus for dancing a Charleston on a taxi, off to India as an eighteen year old where she walked with Ghandi on his peace marches and was arrested – or was it expelled, I can’t quite remember – for anti-British activity. What a gal!)
They were up for an event at the weekend and had been staying in the family’s flat – it was the kind of chance encounter which really helped bring the house alive for us – and we’d only been onsite for half an hour.
A good omen for the project, I hope.
After that we threw some ideas around, to get us started – imagined encounters, insinuated histories, velasheen and manderlac.
As National Trust houses go, Wightwick Manor isn’t very old – it was built new in the late 19th century; built looking old but full of mod cons, like electricity and central heating. This makes its history for a project like this quite recent, which makes chance encounters like today’s all the more interesting.
A wedding was scheduled in the house at 12, so we (Sonia, Richard and me) only had time for a quick look at the rooms we are going to work in before the wedding party arrived.
As we were coming out of the drawing room we were passed by two women, who I assumed must be NT volunteers, and I asked them a casual question about a photo on one of the sides.
“Oh, that’s Anthea – our half-sister”
By accident we had fallen into conversation with two of the members of the Mander family, the original occupants and builders of the house.
What followed was a series of stories and anecdotes about the family, what the house was like when they were children & their mother (an extraordinary woman – expelled from four boarding schools, arrested in Piccadilly Circus for dancing a Charleston on a taxi, off to India as an eighteen year old where she walked with Ghandi on his peace marches and was arrested – or was it expelled, I can’t quite remember – for anti-British activity. What a gal!)
They were up for an event at the weekend and had been staying in the family’s flat – it was the kind of chance encounter which really helped bring the house alive for us – and we’d only been onsite for half an hour.
A good omen for the project, I hope.
After that we threw some ideas around, to get us started – imagined encounters, insinuated histories, velasheen and manderlac.
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