Our last session as a group
Yesterday our last session together was a tour of the County Hall site with Tom from NRO as our guide. One of our commissioners Philip Meadows Martineau had a summer house built on the site, designed by William Wilkins (www.chambermusicians.org.uk/william_wilkins.htm ) with the parkland landscaped by Humphry Repton (www.themorgan.org/collections/works/repton/default…) both of which had prominent reputations in their respective fields and a Norfolk connection. It would have been a lovely place with views down to the river. Martineau, in his will left the house and grounds to his wife and then his daughter. When his daughter died the house and grounds passed to a distant nephew who sold the estate to the Coleman family. They in turn, in the 1960’s sold it to the County Council. The idea was to centralize the existing geographical locations of the Council employees and thus County Hall was designed and built.
As we walked around Tom pointed out where the house would have sat (in the car park) and landscape features. Some trees on the site could be from Repton’s time or before. There is a stone archway in the trees, a folly which would have stood next to a small chapel which housed a visitors book. The arch still stands (the stonework was taken from the former cathedral site) but the chapel is reduced to some footings and some cut stones around and about.
I found myself very disappointed that the Martineau house had been knocked down during the construction of the new building There was some thought about keeping and using the house as council offices but this was not to be, so the house was cleared. This tour completed our set of tours to sites connected with the commissioners. The activity of walking has led to many conversations and possibilities.
After the tour and a welcome cup of tea we had a look at some documents relating to the site. Looking at a series of maps of the area we try to see the changes that have occurred to the site through the documentary evidence. In amongst the documents is a bill of sale for the property, photographs mounted in a book taken when the land was being cleared and copies of publicity photographs and articles. The building won an architectural prize at the time and I can see why: its innovative use of materials and the aesthetics of having the entrance hall glazed both sides so people could literally see through the building from front to back. It feels like it looms large in the landscape but was designed to sit into the hillside which was one of its celebrated features.
We decided on an early lunch so we could look at follow up documents we ordered after our Parliamentary Archives visit. Just as I was chatting to Susan about the documents the fire alarm went off (second time since I have been working there) and we all had to evacuate and we spent time sitting in the aforementioned entrance hall of the main County Hall building waiting for the all clear from the fire service.
