ANNUAL REVIEW 2010–11 CONTENTS 1 Chairman’s Foreword 3 Chief Executive’s Review 6 Completed Projects 24 Projects Under Development 58 AHF Financial Information 62 About the AHF FRONT COVER: Lissan House (see p.18) INSIDE FRONT COVER: Sandycombe Lodge (see p.29) CHAIRMAN’S FOREWORD It is good to be able to start this 35th Anniversary year’s Foreword to the Annual Review with some positive news. We were delighted to be successful in our bid for the new £2 million ‘Challenge Fund for Historic Buildings at Risk’ which is generously co-funded by the Andrew Lloyd Webber Foundation and English Heritage. The AHF looks forward to making a real difference with this funding over the next three to five years. Our Chief Executive, Ian Lush, explains more about the Challenge Fund in his Review. We were equally pleased to be asked authorities continue to be key to this, by Historic Scotland to run on their and we were pleased that so many Welsh behalf the three-year Buildings at Risk authorities were represented at our Initiative. This aims to bring the major buildings at risk seminar in Swansea in stakeholders in Scotland together to look March, showing their commitment to this at ways of tackling more projects, whether vital work. undertaken by the commercial, public or voluntary sectors, and to highlight good We hope to be able to extend the Cold practice and lessons for the future. Spots initiative over the coming year, and are working with English Heritage on their These new programmes, together with programme to highlight Industrial Heritage our ongoing work to increase activity in at Risk; we will announce details of this some cold spots around the UK, have in due course. given the AHF the opportunity to bring in additional resources at a time when most We said goodbye at the end of March to organisations are having to cut back. John Pavitt, a dedicated member of the We are particularly grateful to all of our Council of Management for 13 years. John major funders – English Heritage, Historic also acted as the AHF’s representative on Scotland, Cadw, the Northern Ireland the Board of the Association of Preservation Environment Agency, the Andrew Lloyd Trusts for many years. We are pleased to Webber Foundation, the J Paul Getty Jnr welcome Phil Kirby as John’s replacement. Charitable Trust and the Pilgrim Trust – for their continued and generous support I am indebted to my colleagues on the in these difficult times. Council of Management for their hard work over the last year, during which Helping projects to get underway in a time The Architectural Heritage Fund has also of economic uncertainty is a real challenge, produced a new five-year strategy and and one which the AHF cannot undertake operational plan and to our dedicated Lion Chambers (see p.45) alone. Our relationship with partners staff whose loyalty and commitment such as local authorities, government remains impressive. departments and agencies, other funders and third sector organisations is more important than ever, and it has been encouraging to see a continued willingness from so many of these to work with us to secure viable and sustainable futures John Townsend for buildings at risk. Despite the many Chairman pressures on their resources, local October 2011 1 35 YEARS CHIEF EXECUTIVE’S REVIEW This, the year in which we mark our 35th Anniversary, has been both an exciting and unusual one for The Architectural Heritage Fund. As our Chairman, John Townsend, has said in his Foreword, unlike many organisations in our sector, we have been fortunate to see significant growth in our resources and in our ability to help projects, especially in England. At the same time we have seen some of our regular clients facing real financial difficulties, in some cases threatening the existence of their organisation. This is also impacting on the ability of some of the AHF’s borrowers to repay their outstanding loans, which in turn affects the ‘revolving’ nature of the AHF’s endowment fund. In the midst of all this one thing has initial grants in the Autumn. This is the remained apparent, which is that even in first time in its 35 year history that the AHF the face of economic and social challenges, has been able to give large capital grants, voluntary sector groups continue to as opposed to loans, and we look forward undertake projects restoring and finding to reporting on the impact these have had viable new uses for historic buildings in next year’s Annual Review. at risk throughout the UK. This Annual Review contains details of projects which The success of our Challenge Fund bid have been completed in the last year, plus showed the strength of our relationship many more that are making good progress with English Heritage, as does the support towards completion. The range of uses they have given to our Cold Spots initiative, and groups involved is impressive, and where we are working alongside their shows that the heritage sector had been focus on Industrial Heritage at Risk. The operating the ‘localism’ agenda years same can be said of our work with Historic before the expression was coined. Scotland, who endorsed their support of the AHF by inviting us to manage on One of the most exciting developments their behalf the new Buildings at Risk of the past year has been our successful Co-ordinator post for Scotland. Stuart bid to English Heritage and the Andrew Eydmann, an experienced conservation Lloyd Webber Foundation for support professional, emerged successful from a for what has now become known as the strong field of candidates for this role and Challenge Fund for Historic Buildings started his work in April; as I write, the at Risk in England – an accurate, if not first Stakeholder Forum meeting for this particularly snappy, title. The contributions initiative has just been held and interesting of £1 million over the next five years from ideas are already being generated by Stuart each organisation are remarkably generous in his discussions with people throughout in the current financial climate, and I am the historic environment sector in Scotland. especially grateful to Lord Lloyd Webber We are grateful to Ruth Parsons, Chief Dalton Young clock tower (see p.37) and Mark Wordsworth, Chairman of the Executive, and her colleague and our main Foundation, and to Simon Thurley, Chief contact at Historic Scotland, Martin Fairley, Executive of English Heritage, for their for their warm ongoing support. This is the first personal commitment to this initiative. In Wales we held a successful seminar time in its 35 year We have already received a large number in Swansea in March to look at ways of history that the AHF of enquiries and applications for support tackling buildings at risk in South Wales, has been able to from this Fund, even though the criteria as part of the Cold Spots initiative and are very specific – to qualify, projects must with a particular focus on bringing give large capital involve buildings of Grade II* or above, in together local authorities and the voluntary grants, as opposed England, which are on the Heritage at Risk sector. Working with the Association of Register – and we will be announcing the Preservation Trusts we were able to attract to loans … 3 ABOVE: most of the South Wales local authorities have benefited greatly from this support. South Rotunda, Glasgow and representatives from other funding Despite this we continue to work closely (see p.46) bodies and community groups, and several with the Northern Ireland Environment BELOW: potential projects have already been Agency and are grateful for their support Threadneedle Street, Peterhead identified as a direct result of the seminar. of our core work, especially given the (see p.20) pressures they also face. OPPOSITE: This year has also seen the AHF offer its Cultybraggan Camp (see p.44) first grants under the Cold Spots initiative, On the wider heritage, regeneration and with recipients so far including the Coker cultural sector issues, we have maintained Rope and Sail Trust in Somerset and a close watching brief on the Localism Bill, ‘ABC’ in Wales, who are working on rural working with our colleagues at the Heritage vernacular buildings with a view to turning Alliance, of which I remain Deputy Chair. them into social housing. The scheme is There are still concerns over the impact enabling us to help projects in their early this could have on the planning system, stages or at points where they have stalled but we welcome the opportunities that it for lack of other support, and we are hoping could present for communities through that we may be able to bring in some the potential transfer of assets. However, additional resources towards it during the issue remains with this and much of the this financial year. wider Big Society agenda that community groups will need both financial and capacity The picture in Northern Ireland has not building support to enable them to take been as positive as in the rest of the UK: advantage of these opportunities. the financial constraints there have led to the cessation of funding for the scheme we I wrote about this issue earlier this year for were running on behalf of the Government an article on the transfer of local authority to support the acquisition of historic assets in the Society for the Protection of buildings at risk. Although we understood Ancient Buildings (SPAB) magazine. This the reasons for this, it was disappointing, was picked up by the national press, my in particular because there were a number views on the threats and opportunities of projects waiting to go ahead which could then appearing in seven daily and Sunday 4 newspapers and in an interview for BBC Radio London.