The Landmark Trust Spring Raffle 2012 is the opportunity for you to win the Landmark break you have always dreamed of, while raising vital funds to save endangered historic buildings. First prize is £5,000 to spend on your choice of Landmark holidays.
On Tuesday 7 February, between 4pm to 8.30pm, Landmark will be one of six independent UK-based travel operators hosting an evening in Chandos House, Queen Anne Street, London W1G 9LQ.
There is the opportunity to join us, to meet some of our staff over wine and canapés or indeed to look at the other companies represented if foreign travel appeals.
Places are limited so they will be allocated on a first come, first served basis. Please email Nina Howe-Davies at nhd@landmarktrust.org.uk or telephone her on 01628 512128 with your full postal address as soon as possible if you would like to join us. You are welcome to bring a guest with you.
Come and meet us at the Destinations show, Earls Court
10 January 2012
The Landmark Trust will be taking part in ‘Destinations - The Holiday and Travel Show’ at Earls Court from Thursday 2 to Sunday 5 February 2012.
We have 50 complimentary pairs of tickets to give away that will give you free entry to Earls Court (or to the Manchester Show on 19 to 22 January).
If you would like to receive a complimentary ticket please email Nina Howe-Davies at nhd@landmarktrust.org.uk or telephone her on 01628 512128 with your full postal address. Tickets will be sent out on a first come first served basis.
Sadly last week we had to sell Edale Mill. This was a reluctant sale, forced on us by legislation which allows leaseholders to buy out the freehold from their landlord. Landmark was owner of the whole mill and the Landmark flat was just one of several flats in the building, all the others being owned by leaseholders who took advantage of the legislation to buy the freehold. It is very sad to lose a Landmark but we can take comfort in the fact that we have saved the building from dereliction and given it a new life, and in that respect our work is done and has a lasting and positive impact.
We took Edale Mill on in 1969 when it was in a ruinous state and it has provided many hundreds of people with memorable holidays since 1973.
It is with great appreciation for all he has done for Landmark that we bid Martin Drury farewell as he steps down as Chairman of Landmark’s trustees this week. We are delighted that Martin’s successor is Neil Mendoza. Neil has a background in publishing and the arts, and is a keen Landmarker.
Passers-by were greeted by an unusual sight at Swarkestone Pavilion recently, when a Rolling Stones tribute band set up and played on the grass outside. The BBC’s Inside Out for the East Midlands region were filming a piece on a photo shoot which took place there more than 40 years ago – originally an attempt to create the album cover for Beggars Banquet.
The programme is available on the BBC iPlayer here until Monday 21 November. The story starts at around 18 minutes 35 seconds.
Lundy is being threatened by the proposal to build a huge offshore wind farm of up to 416 turbines, just seven miles from the island. While the Landmark Trust supports efforts to provide renewable energy, we strongly believe that the proximity of the proposed wind farm to Lundy would have a devastating effect. Please help us to stop this happening by emailing an objection.
After a 2 year restoration, Cowside, an early eighteenth-century farmstead opens this weekend. It has remained remarkably unaltered over the past 300 years and offers evidence of a past way of Dales life - a rare and important example of its kind.
During the restoration, rare wall paintings were found beneath layers of later limewash. These will be on display during the Open Day on Sunday 16 October from 10am to 4pm, and information about the building’s history and restoration will be available. Entry is free.
Please note: Cowside is in a very rural location and access during the Open Day will require you to park and walk for approximately a mile, we therefore suggest walking attire for your visit.
For more information on this Landmark, please visit our Cowside page, or to find out about our Open Days, please our Visiting Landmarks page.
Thank you to everyone who entered our Summer Postcard Competition. We had a large number of excellent entries with many inspirational images and words about Landmark holidays.
Congratulations to all the winners and runners-up. Their winning entries can now be viewed on our Summer Competition page with the judge’s comments.
The restoration of the garden at Hackfall, North Yorkshire has recently been rewarded with European recognition. The Grade I picturesque eighteenth-century woodland garden has undergone a major restoration project led by the Woodland Trust and The Hackfall Trust, of which our lease and repair of The Ruin played a part. The Gothic woodland garden has been revived along with its castle, follies, cascades and fountain. Hackfall was awarded a 2011 European Union Prize for Cultural Heritage in the Europa Nostra Awards and celebrated its success over the past weekend with special events.
The Landmark Fund has been created to provide vital funds for some unexpected and pressing projects, many of which could not have been foreseen when we originally rescued the buildings. Please donate today to help support projects such as repairing the Coade stone façade of The Egyptian House in Penzance.
The £610,000 needed to save this fine Grade II* listed folly perched on a hill top overlooking Kimbolton Castle in Cambridgeshire has been secured. We can now start work to restore the decaying eye-catcher and then let it for holidays giving it a new use and an income to support its future maintenance.
The Warren House is an important element within the Kimbolton landscape and a reminder of the past. We are very grateful to all those who have donated to our appeal which has ensured it will once again become an elegant eye-catcher for the village and a most wonderful place to stay.
Grants from The Monument Trust, English Heritage and Huntingdonshire District Council provided the first £500,000 of funding ahead of the public fundraising appeal launched last November. The Landmark Trust has now reached its target after raising £110,000 from many generous individual donors and trusts.
The building is now fully scaffolded and the external failing render is being stripped off to enable repairs to the underlying timber frame.
We will open The Warren House in 2012. Visit our Future Landmarks page to find out more.
Thanks to the generosity of many Landmark supporters, we have secured the £600,000 needed to save The Shore Cottages at Berriedale, Caithness. We are now beginning to restore this row of fishermen’s cottages, which are located in a peaceful cove with magnificent views of craggy cliffs and isolated sea-stacks. Once work is completed in 2012, the cottages will be let as a Landmark for two and another for six. The rental income will support the buildings’ ongoing maintenance.
Thank you to everyone who generously donated to our appeal.
Thanks to the generosity of everyone who played our Spring Raffle this year, we have raised over £85,000 towards the rescue and restoration of historic buildings at risk.
The lucky winners were drawn on 20 May and have all been notified. The full list is now available to view on our Raffle page.
As the two-year long restoration nears completion, we are opening bookings for Cowside for stays from Friday 21 October 2011. The Yorkshire farmstead will make a fine and remote Landmark for five with sweeping views down the fell.
Visit our Cowside page for more information, or telephone the Booking Office to make a booking. Online bookings for Cowside will open from 1 June.
The new edition, the 24th, of the Landmark Trust Handbook is now available. We have carried out a major redesign, giving a contemporary twist to an old favourite.
The 272-page Handbook includes lots of new photography and makes an interesting present as well as, we hope, a good read. It contains details of ten new Landmarks, as well as the latest plans of all existing ones, together with a series of articles about Landmark’s conservation work and our approach to furnishing our buildings. The cost of the Handbook remains £10 plus postage and packing.
You can purchase it on Handbook page, by telephoning 01628 825925.
The ongoing restoration of Astley Castle in Warwickshire reached a significant milestone on Tuesday when a series of massive concrete pre-cast lintels were lifted across the moat and placed onto the existing ruins. The main lintel, which was t-shaped, weighed in at almost four tonnes and is 7.2 metres in length, had to be lowered in through the roof of the scaffold and then manoeuvred to sit on three brick piers.
Work at Astley Castle has progressed well and this latest stage marks the halfway point in this phase of the project. The lintels form part of the framework for the new accommodation which is being fitted inside the historic ruins.
Plans to restore Warder’s Tower in Greenway Bank Country Park have had to be abandoned after bats using the top floor of the tower as a maternity roost prevented its planned restoration.
All bats and their roosting places are protected by law and bats are often found in disused historic buildings. Bat surveys were undertaken at Warder’s Tower in 2008 and 2009/10. Both surveys found evidence suggesting the building is used by several species of bats all year round for breeding, hibernating or foraging. Four bat species have been recorded at Warder’s Tower: Daubenton’s; brown long-eared; and common and soprano pipistrelle, with the Daubenton’s using the tower as a significant maternity roost.
Different options, such as to leave the top floor as a roost or to build a facsimile tower alongside, have been assessed with the relevant authorities to try to find a way to continue with the plans to restore Warder’s Tower and give it a new use as a Landmark, but none were considered viable or proportionate. The tower, which is in a severe state of disrepair, will now be handed back to its owners Staffordshire County Council and sadly once again faces an uncertain future.
We are contacting all of those who so generously donated to the appeal.
The Warren House is a fine Grade II* folly which stands alone on an escarpment overlooking Kimbolton Castle in Cambridgeshire. This derelict, 16th century, timber-framed building is on the English Heritage Buildings at Risk Register and desperately needs your help.
The Warren House has an intriguing history, please watch our latest video to learn more and understand why this important folly should not be lost forever.
Please make a donation online today and help us raise the final funds. We are so close, any donation, no matter what size, will make a valuable contribution.
The winner of the competition to design a new knot garden for Astley Garden is Kate Heppell from Chorleywood, Herts. She will now work closely with us to see her design realised.
The judges unanimously chose Kate's design from over 100 entries as it "stood out as a contemporary design yet one that is highly symbolic of both the past and the future. The views both towards and away from the castle have been carefully considered. It offers a range of both practical and interesting spaces and a variety of textures and scents. Kate has also offered an additional solution to meet the needs of wheelchair users”.
Congratulations to Kate and all the winners and highly commended entries in each category, all of which can be viewed on our Get involved at Astley Castle page.
Our plans to restore the Grade II* listed Belmont in Lyme Regis take a step forward this week as our application to West Dorset Council for Listed Building Consent has been filed.
Belmont was once seaside villa of Eleanor Coade, the eighteenth-century inventor of an artificial cast stone known as Coade Stone, and later the home of author John Fowles from 1968 until his death in 2005.
There will be a free public talk by Landmark's historian, Caroline Stanford on the history of Belmont and the Landmark Trust's prosposals for its restoration. All are welcome to the talk on Friday 8 October at the Masonic Hall, Broad Street, Lyme Regis.
We are keen to know what you think, so please email us at info@landmarktrust.org.uk, or for more information on the plans and the story so far, visit our Future Landmarks page.
Today we celebrate the formation of Landmark France with the official opening of our first three French Landmarks. Sir Peter Westmacott, the British Ambassador in France, will be attending the launch event along with our Director, Peter Pearce, and Yves Colcombet, Directeur of the Conservatoire du littoral.
The opening of the three Landmarks at Le Moulin de la Tuilerie marks the start of Landmark France’s operations - a separate not-for-profit organisation set up by the Landmark Trust to assist in the preservation of historic buildings in France.
Art exhibition by local schools and artists at Hinckley Library
13 August 2010
An exhibition of artwork inspired by the history and restoration of Astley Castle will be on display in Hinckley Library from 16 August to 10 September. The exhibition features artwork created by four local schools and the Astley Art Group.
The exhibition is open during normal library hours and there is a special open evening on Monday 23 August from 5.30pm to 7.30pm to which everyone is welcome to attend. Initiatives such as these art projects are funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund to enable local people to get more closely involved in the project and learn more about an important part of their local heritage.
The Landmark Trust has over 180 buildings in England, Scotland and Wales, which means that this summer you can enjoy an unforgettable holiday without leaving the UK.
Why not spend a week in a thirteenth-century hall at Purton Green in Suffolk, or enjoy the peace and seclusion of staying at Ty Capel near Snowdonia. Relax by the sea at The Farmhouse in Cornwall, or soak up the atmosphere of a bustling city from The Steward's House in Oxford.
For more Landmark summer holiday ideas click here.
Four Landmarks feature in an exhibition at Potterton Books, 93 Lower Sloane Street, London SW1W. In a collection of prints, collages, paintings and mixed-media work, Kluz celebrates the folly as an expression of unconscious eccentricity. On until 3 July, the Music Room, Clavell Tower, The Chateau and the Egyptian House all feature in the exhibition.
The RICS announced Queen Anne's Summerhouse as the winner of the East of England RICS Building Conservation Award 2010. Each year the RICS sets out to find the very best construction and conservation projects and Queen Anne's Summerhouse beat off strong competition to win the prestigious award. The project will now go forward into the national competition. The restoration has also recently been highly commended by the Museums and Heritage Awards 2010.
The year long restoration of Queen Anne's Summerhouse was completed last Autumn supported by a number of grants and donations, including a grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund. The building is proving to be a very popular place to stay.
Read more about the restoration here, or to find out when our next open day is click here.
As part of their annual programme, the Patrons of Landmark had the opportunity last month to visit Oxenford Gatehouse, in Surrey. Over afternoon tea, Caroline Stanford, Landmark's Historian, explained the history of the site, and led a tour of the gatehouse and outbuildings.
In the morning, our Patrons had enjoyed a private tour of the Brooking Home Study Collection in Cranleigh, Surrey led by Charles Brooking himself. The private galleries form part of the Brooking Collection, Britain's only comprehensive collection of architectural detail originating from domestic and commercial buildings.
The first guests arrive today signalling the start of a new future for Cavendish Hall. Cavendish Hall is an elegant early Regency villa of considerable charm and was the beloved home of Mrs Pamela Matthews until her death in 2005. Together with the gift of the house, Mrs Matthews' executors have funded its refurbishment - a major undertaking which would have been difficult to fund from any other source.
This handsome, double-fronted house is surrounded by a small wooded park in rolling Suffolk countryside near Clare and currently has availability throughout the summer.
Today we announce our first French buildings at Edward, Duke of Windsor and Wallis Simpson's former country residence, Le Moulin de la Tuilerie, in Gif-sur-Yvette, 35km SW of Paris.
Landmark France was set up after the Landmark Trust signed a unique cross-cultural partnership agreement with the French government coastal conservation agency, le Conservatoire du littoral, to pursue together the restoration of historic buildings owned by the Conservatoire round the French coast. Landmark France and the Conservatoire already have active restoration projects in Brittany and Charente-Maritime. However, the first French Landmarks come from a different source and the income they generate will help fund Landmark France's ongoing activities in France.
Le Moulin de la Tuilerie will become Landmark's first French buildings when they open for holidays later this year. The site is now privately owned and in need of a new future. Formerly an 18th-century tile-making mill, the Windsors made the main building their country house and created additional accommodation for their guests in the outbuildings. Landmark will let Le Moulin (for twelve), La Maison des Amis (for four) and Le Célibataire (for two) for holidays from summer 2010.
Click here for more information on the buildings, or for further information on Landmark France in French click here, or English click here.
In Britain we are lucky to be surrounded by history and with the wide spread of Landmarks many provide perfect bases from which to explore the UKs many World Heritage Sites.
Whether walking the South West Coast path through the spectacular Jurassic coastline, or along the blustery Hadrian's Wall, whether marvelling at the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct, or relaxing at Studley Royal Park, Landmarks can offer an unparalleled refuge at the end of a long day.
Visit our new World Heritage sites web page to find out which Landmarks are close to the UK's most important historic places.
To celebrate World Book Day, we have put together a selection of Landmarks which are all in some way linked to literature. Visit our Literary Landmarks page to browse just some of them.
Every Landmark has of course a specially chosen library, so any could provide a wonderful place to escape and curl up with a good book.
The restoration project to turn Oxenford Gatehouse into a Landmark to give it a new future has been completed and tonight its first guests will arrive.
Set in a rural location on the edge of a working farm and overlooking other Pugin-designed structures and a medieval fishpond, it offers a peaceful retreat for up to four people.
Commissioned by the 5th Viscount Midleton from A.W. Pugin in 1843 ? while Pugin was building The Grange - this is Pugin at his Picturesque best, adapting the forms of the Middle Ages for his own time. Peter Pearce, Director of the Landmark Trust said, "We are very proud to have a second building by Augustus Pugin in our portfolio. He was one of the UK's most influential architects and through Landmark, people can experience living for a short time in one of his buildings."
For more information, prices and to book, please click here.
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Sadly last week we had to sell Edale Mill. This was a reluctant sale, forced on us by legislation which allows leaseholders to buy out the freehold from their landlord. Landmark was owner of the whole mill and the Landmark flat was just one of several flats in the building, all the others being owned by leaseholders who took advantage of the legislation to buy the freehold. It is very sad to lose a Landmark but we can take comfort in the fact that we have saved the building from dereliction and given it a new life, and in that respect our work is done and has a lasting and positive impact.%20-%20190x.jpg)
It is with great appreciation for all he has done for Landmark that we bid Martin Drury farewell as he steps down as Chairman of Landmark’s trustees this week. We are delighted that Martin’s successor is Neil Mendoza. Neil has a background in publishing and the arts, and is a keen Landmarker..jpg)
Passers-by were greeted by an unusual sight at 
The £610,000 needed to save this fine Grade II* listed folly perched on a hill top overlooking Kimbolton Castle in Cambridgeshire has been secured. We can now start work to restore the decaying eye-catcher and then let it for holidays giving it a new use and an income to support its future maintenance.
Thanks to the generosity of many Landmark supporters, we have secured the £600,000 needed to save 
Thanks to the generosity of everyone who played our Spring Raffle this year, we have raised over £85,000 towards the rescue and restoration of historic buildings at risk.
The ongoing restoration of Astley Castle in Warwickshire reached a significant milestone on Tuesday when a series of massive concrete pre-cast lintels were lifted across the moat and placed onto the existing ruins. The main lintel, which was t-shaped, weighed in at almost four tonnes and is 7.2 metres in length, had to be lowered in through the roof of the scaffold and then manoeuvred to sit on three brick piers.
Today we celebrate the formation of Landmark France with the official opening of our first three French Landmarks. Sir Peter Westmacott, the British Ambassador in France, will be attending the launch event along with our Director, Peter Pearce, and Yves Colcombet, Directeur of the Conservatoire du littoral.
An exhibition of artwork inspired by the history and restoration of Astley Castle will be on display in Hinckley Library from 16 August to 10 September. The exhibition features artwork created by four local schools and the Astley Art Group. 
The Landmark Trust has over 180 buildings in England, Scotland and Wales, which means that this summer you can enjoy an unforgettable holiday without leaving the UK.
Four Landmarks feature in an exhibition at Potterton Books, 93 Lower Sloane Street, London SW1W. In a collection of prints, collages, paintings and mixed-media work, Kluz celebrates the folly as an expression of unconscious eccentricity. On until 3 July, the Music Room, Clavell Tower, The Chateau and the Egyptian House all feature in the exhibition. 
The RICS announced 
In Britain we are lucky to be surrounded by history and with the wide spread of Landmarks many provide perfect bases from which to explore the UKs many World Heritage Sites.
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