Posts Tagged ‘National Trust’

National Trust – The Album

Friday, June 18th, 2010
Ham House (image from the National Trust website)

Ham House (image from the National Trust website)

For those of you who (like myself) love the peace and quiet of a historic building or garden, but sometimes begrudge having to share this tranquility with other visitors, the National Trust recently released an album of sounds from various NT locations, which means you can have a little of the magic in your own home.

The album, curated by the brilliant Jarvis Cocker, contains sounds from the clocktower at Blickling Hall and footsteps through Ham House, among others.You can find out more about this album here. There is also an interesting article on The Independent website, although this mainly focuses on Cocker’s role in the project.

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Posted in Heritage News, Other Groups, Other sites | No Comments »

Homes fit for Heroes: photographs by Bill Brandt 1939-1943. A book review

Friday, April 16th, 2010
Click for more info

Click for more info

Homes fit for Heroes is a remarkable collection of wartime photographs of domestic life in Birmingham.  Bill Brandt was commissioned by the Bournville Village Trust to record life in the cramped and often squalid Back to Backs in which so many people lived and also photograph life in newer, more modern homes.  There are also a few images taken in Camden Hill in London.

In many ways these images make the ordinary striking.  Brandt wrote that he found:

atmosphere to be the spell that charged the commonplace with beauty

and these images certainly reflect that.

They were taken around the time of BVT was preapring When We Build Again, a book arguing for quality homes for families after the war  and published in 1941 by Allen and Unwin.  It was also the name of a remarkable documentary shot in Birmingham and released in 1943.

The book contains a detailed introduction by Peter James (head of photography at Birmingham Library) and Richard Sadler (who was head photography at Derby University at the time)  which not only explains the history of the images but also the story of how they were lost and then re-found.

At then end is a postscript by Dr Mike Beazley of the Centre for Urban and Regional Studies at the University of Birmingham on some work being carried out in 2004 to put these photos in the wider historical context.

If you are a lover of the domestic history of Birmingham and great documentary photography treat yourself – buy this book!

Some of the images may also appear in Birmingham Back to Backs from National Trust Guidebooks.

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Posted in BirminghamUK, Book Reviews, Pictures | 1 Comment »

Join the National Trust and help us

Sunday, March 21st, 2010
Click the image to go to the National Trust Membership site

Click the image to go to the National Trust Membership site

This weekend saw the doors creak open to visitors in hundreds of historic properties across Britain. If the spring sunshine has got you thinking of all the brilliant places you could visit then we would, naturally enough, encourage you to join the National Trust.

Why should you do such a generous thing? Not simply because it means your can visit hundreds of wonderful places for free – but also because we get a cut.

If you join the National Trust online using this link

http://nationaltrustmembershipsshop.at/birminghamconservation?CTY=13

then two wonderful things happen:

  1. The National Trust gives you 12 months for the price of 9 – because it’s cheaper for them to have you sign up online.
  2. We get 30% of the value of your membership as the National Trusts way of thanking us for encouraging you to join.

National Trust | Become a memberI think they’ll even send you some free binoculars too!

So you get:

  • membership of a remarkable organisation
  • free days out (ignoring the cost of tea and cakes)
  • the knowledge that you’ve supported two historic building charities in one fell online transaction.

For it to work you need to use this link:

http://nationaltrustmembershipsshop.at/birminghamconservation?CTY=13

If you’re want to know what else you can buy/sign up for and we get a cut then please take a look at

http://www.buy.at/birminghamconservation

You can also support us by shopping through Amazon.

http://astore.amazon.co.uk/birmiconsetru-21

Thank you.

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Posted in Birmingham News, Heritage News, Websites | No Comments »

Ethical Xmas?

Monday, December 14th, 2009

If you like to support charity when buying Christmas gifts here are some ideas: For starters every time you use this http://buy.at/birminghamconservation we get a donation with each thing you buy. (Have a look here for a full list of traders and the percentage they pass on to us – you don’t pay any more and in some cases we get up to £120!).

But the shop includes other charities. For example, use this link:

http://charityshopshop.at/birminghamconservation?CTY=13

Oxfam_s Online Shop – Great value, guilt-free shopping and gifts-1to shop at  Oxfam and we will get 10% of what you spend.  There’s plenty to choose from, including Fairtrade chocolates,  jewellery, a wide range of books, clothes and the Oxfam Unwrapped gifts which directly support families in developing countries.

Many of you will be familiar with the National Trust, they are close partners of ours.  We restored the Back to Backs which they then took over as one of the city’s, indeed the country’s most fascinating museums.

National Trust | Become a memberMembership to the National Trust makes a great gift and if you use this link (or click on the image) then we also get a a proportion of what you spend for encouraging you to do just that!  At the moment they even include a pair of binoculars and give you 12 months membership for the price of 9. Please use this link:

http://nationaltrustmembershipsshop.at/birminghamconservation?CTY=13

Other traders supporting us supporting us who sell goods which you might fit under the ethical banner include Ethical Superstore.   However there are many more including some the biggest names and online reatilers you might use all the time.  Have a good browse through this link.

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