Crafting a New Narrative at Belton House

The Belton Estate is one of the nearest National Trust properties to us, and it’s one we’ve visited a few times - even before we moved up here. The orangery is a favourite of mine, and on the times we’ve visited recently it hasn’t been open, but it was open when we visited last week on the Spring Equinox, but you’ll have to wait for an updated post on that as today I’m going to share more about a new exhibition that’s on in the house.

I first went in the house in the summer of 2021 and as with most things the post-Covid reawakening meant that only a limited number of rooms were available to view, something that I’d forgotten [about our visit] until I read it on my own post! This time though there was much more to see, and the post-Covid timing of my previous visit also explains why I didn’t remember any of the upstairs - I hadn’t been there before!

The exhibition - Artistic Journeys: Crafting a New Narrative - includes previously unseen items from the collection. which will be on display until at least until the house is redressed for Christmas, with exhibits changing regularly. The four artists are:

• Elizabeth Cust (1776 - 1858) a skill oil painter inspired by ‘Old Masters’ to create her own.

• Sophia Cust (1811 - 1882) who documented interior and exterior views of Belton using her favourite medium of watercolours.

• Marian Alford (1817 - 1888) a skilled textile designer and artist who co-founded the Royal School of Needlework.

• Nina Cust (1867 - 1955) a sculptor and poet, whose sculptures were displayed at the Royal Academy and who has published many works of poetry and fiction.

I’m not much of an oil painting fan I’m afraid, and have realised as I’ve been going through my photos, that I have none to share of Elizabeth’s work, and my photos of Nina’s work aren’t good enough to include either - so if you’re here for those, sorry - this isn’t the post for you.

Let’s start with Marian

Marian Alford’s connection to Belton was through her marriage to Viscount Alford, the eldest son of the first Earl Brownlow, and it was in 1984 that Lord Brownlow gave the house to the National Trust.

But Marian’s story took place many years before that. She was instrumental in bringing recognition to embroidery as an art form, and brought recognition to needlework as a respected form of employment for women in all social classes, raising the status of both at at time when seamstresses still worked in apalling conditions.

In 1872 she was one of the three founders of the School of Art Needlework and helped establish the school as a place for formal art education and training, which I think is all the more remarkable as she herself never received an art education, but who developed into a skilled artist and designer.

The embroidery below, along with the sketched pattern. was behind glass (hence the glare) as you entered the upstairs library. The detail of the stitches was amazing, and my favourite part was the thistle on the right hand end.

Downstairs in the Tapestry room there were more examples of her designs this time crafted by Belton volunteers, though as some patterns were incomplete these are creative interpretations of the designs, and no less stunning for that. The original hand-drawn and painted designs are now very fragile having been stored in folios for many years, and sadly can no longer be unfolded without causing damage.

Behind the embroidery hoops draped over a sofa was the most amazing throw - I wish I had more info on this, but I don’t and if it was there I missed it. But look at the detail - this one was carefully behind the ropes, but it’d be great to see this one slightly closer up. And I’d also like a pattern of the designs in the hoops above please!

Sophia’s watercolours

Sophia left Belton when she married, but often returned to her family home and during these visits she created a large collection of watercolours showing the house and gardens, many of which survive today. I particularly liked the three posters on display in the Breakfast room, which had previously been used as an ante-library (when the library was also downstairs) and then when the library moved upstairs a small dining room.

Her watercolours show how Belton looked in the mid 1800s, and is now a valuable resource for the conservation work in the property; they also show how the interior evolved over time with the placement of furniture, textiles and other objects in the rooms. So very much the photos of the day.

Another of her watercolours gave details of Belton’s boathouse which otherwise might have remained a mystery, and her detailed depiction made it possible to reinstate the boathouse, which was originally built in the 1830s. Amazing.

I was also quite taken with the breakfast crockery in the display case, which if you look closely enough at my reflection, you’ll see that I also managed unwittingly to match with my white and lime green striped top!

Two final pieces

Just before we left the house there were two final pieces that caught my eye. The first is this coloured enamel painting on copper, with an iron and silver Art Nouveau frame by the renowned Arts and Crafts enamellist Alexander Fisher of Nina Cust. It dates from 1898 and shows Nina wearing a gold and pink robe holding a cape, and it’s thought that this piece further acknowledged her status as an artist.

Isn’t it exquisite?

The second was this scrapbook - and quite honestly a scrapbook like I’ve not seen before. This was presented to Marian in 1886 as a Christmas gift from the School of Art Needlework. It’s covered in green velvet and embroidered with a gold, metal thread.

Both the house and the exhibition are worth seeing, so do go along if you’re close by or if you’re passing. As I said earlier it will be on for a while yet, and though the exhibits may change the ethos will remain. I’m looking forward to popping back and seeing how it changes, and seeing more detail on the things I’m sure I missed.

And I’ve still more to share, later this week look out for another visit to the Orangery, which now appears to be referred to at the Conservatory - and I think there’ll be another post to come on the ‘bedrooms at Belton’ and there’s some stunners there too!

Planning a greenhouse

At Gardener’s World Live last year one of the things I was keen to look at, apart from all the show gardens and beautiful borders, was greenhouses. We don’t have one here yet, and I’m missing it - pottering about at the greenhouse staging in the garage is ok, but the garage isn’t ideal for germinating seeds, and I really could do with a light, sheltered space for some of our plants to over winter to give them the best chance.

Not too big, not too small

I don’t want a huge greenhouse, though I’ve already doubled the size I first thought of! And I do want to integrate it into our overall garden design.

In our previous house I had the standard 6x8 aluminium Rhino greenhouse, and it was great - but as I’ve said my plans for this garden are a bit smaller. Originally I was looking at a 2x4 patio greenhouse, but given that it needs to be two foot from any boundary for maintenance, that seemed a lot of space for not very much greenhouse at all.

And so I upscaled my tentative plans to a 6x4 - but also preferring the black frame, rather than aluminium. Of course, all of this is just plans at the moment - though I did come dangerously close to buying one of the show greenhouses in one of the sales, but in the end I resisted as I wanted our plans to be a bit more developed first.

Testing it out for size

So would a 6x4 greenhouse work in our space? Well as there’s nothing else really in our garden, apart from the trellis around the heat pump and the small crab apple tree, the answer is clearly a yes, But would it work how I wanted it too, where I envisaged it - or would it dominate the garden?

I decided to try it out using bamboo canes and string. So this visualisation spent a fortnight or so in place in our garden last summer, and no doubt any neighbours that spotted it clearly must have thought we’d lost the plot.

But it worked, well visually of course, not as an actual greenhouse!

It was easy (and easier than it looks in the photo) to see its footprint, how high it would come up the wall, how far it would come into the garden - and most importantly, how dominant it would be from the house. Putting it directly opposite our lounge windows might not seem the most obvious positioning, but I’m hoping it will also help keep it tidy and on the prettier side. I fully intend to retain the greenhouse staging in the garage for the real functional work, and use the greenhouse for what it does best - providing a sheltered growing space.

Of course I spent the time that it was up, looking out of every window to check what it looked like from that vantage point - and I was happy, until of course my temporary structure collapsed a little. But by then it had done its job and confirmed this is the size and location for me.

Now only if the rest of planning the garden was that easy - but more on that another day!

Brutalist buildings, a library and a signal box

Recently I got a bit of a surprise when I opened Instagram, there in front of me was a picture of the library in the town where I grew up, but instead it was now called The Brutalist Library SE25. And you know what, I’d never considered it as this - yes it was a modern building, and one that was quite different in style to those around it, but to me it was just the library. The place to while away hours (and hours) and even sometimes the place to complete secondary school homework.

And since then I don’t think I’ve ever really given in too much thought, so to see it on my Instagram feed was quite a surprise. It turns out that it’s had a bit of a fight on its hands, as libraries have tended to over the years, but it’s still there - and from the photos I’ve seen still looks very much like it did back in the late 1970s and 1980s.

Though I did notice that the circular planters out the front had been changed for a new mosaic - and when I say new, this mosaic is now almost 20 years old! But even so it was good to see it still there, still a library and it reminded me how many memories a single image can evoke.

But it also reminded me of our hunt to locate the brutalist Signal Box at Birmingham New Street before we caught our train back from Gardener’s World Live last year - a building which was on MOH’s list of ‘buildings to see’.

And see it we did, but only from the outside - and it’s quite imposing.

The term brutalist is used for a reason isn’t it? But there’s also some fascinating shapes, angles and textures on this now retired Grade II listed building.

But up until the end of 2022 it continued to play its important part of Britain’s railway since it started operation in 1966 - the signallers inside were capable of directing up to 1200 trains a day. Clearly the 1960s technology was getting harder to maintain, and the manual operation for the power signal box for setting safe routes for trains no longer the preferred way of working with all of Birmingham New Street’s signalling equipment converted to digital operation as you’d expect.

I was fascinated by the remaining items left in the building though, just but not quite visible through the windows - I’m sure this is, and will be if left untouched, a real life sized version of a time capsule!

Brutalist architecture won’t be (and isn’t) to everyone’s taste, but I kind of admire it - its mix of reinforced concrete and concrete cladding definitely mark a moment of time.

I don’t know if my feelings are influenced by my love of visiting the brutalist library in South Norwood, or even by growing up near to Croydon which is also home to structures considered brutalist which to me were just the shopping centre, or the 50p or eggbox building!

Who knows.