Hove Civic Society May 2016 newsletter

Chairman’s letter

Dear Members,

A few weeks ago Stoke Gifford Parish Council decided to charge for the fun run in Little Stoke Park, as it was considered unfair to expect residents who do not run to pay for the upkeep of the paths in the park. Sheffi eld City Council is removing mature street trees to save costs on maintenance of the trees and pavements, and Brighton City Council has now completely cut its tree planting programme as part of the 2016/17 budget.

There are many stories like these around the country and it is the environment that gets hit hardest in the fi ght about who has to make the biggest cuts. As cuts are also brutally affecting education and social services, the environment is the inevitable loser. I believe City Clean alone will have to make a cut of over £6M in the next year.

We know there will be three more years of this, as £68m will need to be taken away from the Council budgets, not to mention the new Business Rate relief announced by the Chancellor, which will deprive the City Council of yet another £50 odd million in 2020. It was previously hoped business rates were going to be available in their entirety to local government.

I cannot comprehend the motivation behind the de facto neutering of local government by central government apart from local government being an easy target for cuts, sheltering central bureaucracy from the same rigours.

What does all this mean for a Civic Society like ours? We had to ask ourselves that question at the time the consultation for Hove Library came up.

Did we agree to the move to a new library/museum in order to save six branch libraries or would we rather keep an ongoing liability like the current library, which was donated by Andrew Carnegie (one of 660 in the United Kingdom and Ireland. He donated 2509 libraries world-wide between 1883 and 1929!).

Or should we demolish the current museum and rebuild a library/museum on site together with some 100 fl ats, which would pay for the library/museum complex as the Regency Society suggested?

Or should it all be moved to the King Alfred site? We found it diffi cult to agree between us and in the end I sent a letter to the City Council expressing our concern that without certainty about what would happen with budgets in the next three years there is no guarantee that there will even be a library service in 2020 – so what use will a new building be then?

This is under the assumption that the library service will not be part of the Trust proposed for the Royal Pavilion Estate. So could the City Council please try to work out a three year budget and try to think the unthinkable?

I am still waiting for a reply!

So we trundle on. Let’s do ourselves what we can do – we are going to have to get used to it!

Our Hove Plinth sculpture project is making good progress and we will launch a crowdfunding campaign in June/July to raise the remaining funds for the plinth and start to make signifi cant inroads into funding the fi rst sculpture.

We are getting much support and I am delighted that our video will be shown as part of the fundraising drive in connection with the Brighton Big Screen in the summer. See details later on in the newsletter. Please join us and support the campaign.

As I write this I am awaiting prices from contractors for street tree planting, and if they come in at the right level we will continue our street tree planting campaign: Restoring our Victorian Street Tree heritage.

We have been given the green light to engage suitable contractors to plant, although we need to go through a formal highways works permission process (at £122 fee per street).

Our fi rst target is planting in Portland Road, where we will work with the Council’s arboriculturalist to bring about a scheme we starting to talk about last year. The difference is that we now need to fund the entire proposal including the parts that the Council would have funded last year. I hope you agree that it is a worthwhile project.

The Hove Business Association has already made a contribution (£500), as has the West Hove Forum (£250). So please help us with this and let’s yet again disprove the old saying that Hove is full of people with deep pockets and short arms.

With best wishes

Helmut LusserAndrew Carnegie, photo credit Davis & Sanford, Library of Congress

Doreen Valiente exhibition

An unexpected benefi t for me was learning about the Lammas festival held annually on Eastbourne Lawns. The word Lammas comes from the Anglo-Saxon. I bought a pretty little hat there which I wore to the investiture at the Royal Pavilion in October 2014. The festival supports the RNLI and other charities, and there are a variety of stalls, food, music, Morris dancing and drumming, and the associated ceremony to celebrate Lammas, the festival of the wheat harvest. This year’s will be on the week-end of 30/31 July.

Last year I stayed for the closing ceremony on the Sunday - all very fascinating. An enormous loaf, shaped like a wheatsheaf, was cut into pieces and distributed to everyone. Pagan or Christian, harvest festival is always popular.

Elaine Evans

Doreen Valiente, courtesy of the Doreen Valiente Foundation

Hove Plinth fi lm on Brighton Big Screen

The Hove Plinth video will join a fantastic programme of fi lm and sports at Brighton Big Screen on the beach this summer. The video will be screened every night from 10th June to 10th July with a call to action to support the project by making a donation via text message.

We will also have a VIP reception one evening including a display of the sculpture maquettes in the grandstand area. This is a great opportunity to reach big audiences and we are very grateful to Brighton Big Screen and to Murray Media for giving us this opportunity.

During the same period the Hove Plinth project will also run a web-based crowdfunding campaign to raise the remaining funds for the plinth, the landscaping and the technical infrastructure The project will be presented on www.crowdfunder.co.uk and will be widely publicized.

People will be able to pledge donations and they will be offered rewards for different levels of contributions. The rewards will include tickets to Brighton Big Screen, signed copies of the PMSA publication Sculptures in Sussex, sculpture trail booklets for Brighton and opportunities to visit a sculptor’s studio.

We will email HCS members information and a link to the site when we launch - so please pledge your support and forward the email to as many people as possible.

Many of our great Victorian sculptures were funded by public contributions - let’s take a leaf out of their book and show that we can do the same via the easy routes availa-ble to us in the digital age.

So a great summer is forecast for Hove Plinth, moving us closer to our target of launching the plinth and the fi rst sculpture in spring 2017.

Karin Janzon

I very much enjoy representing our Society on the City’s Commemorative Plaques Panel, and some interesting unveilings are coming up in the next few months. However, the most colourful (literally) unveiling that I’ve attended so far took place on the summer solstice in June 2013, and you can read about it in the Sept 2013 news-letter.

The plaque commemorated Doreen Valiente, “the mother of modern witchcraft”, and the pagan ritual and drumming at the Old Steine fountain and the Hunter’s Moon Morris dancers at the plaque made it a day to remember. I quote from the newsletter: “(Doreen’s) arte-facts and books are in trust. In fact, plans are in progress for a museum of witchcraft, probably in Brighton”.

The Doreen Valiente Foundation have been working hard on this, and have set up an exhibition at Preston Manor, now open until 30 September (closed Mondays). I attended the offi cial opening on Saturday, April 2, and it was so interesting to learn more about the beliefs and rituals of our pagan ancestors. Admission to the Manor is £6.60 for adults, £5.50 for concessions and £3.30 for Brighton & Hove residents (proof needed).

You can also see the Hove Plinth fi lm at www.hovecivic.org.uk

2016 is all set to be another year of exemplary quality and variety from award-winning artists and venues in Hove Arts - indeed last year Dion Salvador Lloyd’s venue won the Best Open House Award.

Stunning exhibitions, working studios and curated shows provide inspiration and delight for all ages, and children’s interaction with the arts is encouraged with the Hove Trotter Children’s Passport.

This year there are 14 venues on the Hove Arts trail, including five new ones, featuring the works of over 80 local artists. You can see a wide range of ceramics, glass, sculpture, mosaics, paintings and jewellery.

Check out the venues pages on www.hovearts.com to see information and images for all the venues and plan some inspiring days exploring the talents of Hove.

Artists Open Houses takes place during the Brighton festival weekends, starting on the 30th April and continuing throughout May (Sat/Sun 30/1, 7/8, 14/15, 21/22, 28/29).

All the Hove Arts houses are also open on the Bank Holiday Mondays - the 2nd and 30th of May.

Hove is where the art is! Hazel Reeves unveils Gresley statue

Hazel Reeves with her statue of Sir Nigel Gresley

Venue 1 9a Hove Place

Venue 2 The Claremont

Venue 3 Cameron Contemporary Art

Venue 4 Sue Penrose Mosaics and Guests

Venue 5 Ceramica

Venue 6 City Retreat

Venue 7 The Flamingo House

Hove Arts venue map

Venue 8 Mary Penley - Biscuit Studio

Venue 9 Dion Salvador Lloyd

Venue 10 51 Wilbury Road

Venue 11 Tessa Wolfe Murray and Guests

Venue 12 A Place of Safety

Venue 13 Wolf at the Door

Venue 14 8 Bishop’s Road

Our very own Hove Plinth sculptor advisor, Hazel Reeves SWA FRSA, unveiled her statue of the eminent railway engineer Sir Nigel Gresley at King’s Cross station on the 5th April to great acclaim.

The award-winning figurative sculptor from Brighton, Ms Reeves, said:

“Sir Nigel Gresley designed steam engines that pushed boundaries of both speed and elegance of design; I hope that my statue of this great engineer helps ensure his achievements are re-discovered and celebrated for generations to come.”

Gresley’s Flying Scotsman was recently seen by thousands of fans as it travelled the East Coast Mainline, from King’s Cross to York, following ten years of restoration. Another of his famous steam engines is the Mallard, which set an unbroken speed record of 126mph in 1938.

Hazel Reeves’ work has been exhibited in over 60 galleries and sculpture trails UK-wide and as well as teaching at Sussex Sculpture Studios and Phoenix Brighton she has been a member of the Hove Plinth public sculpture group since its start.

Congratulations to Hazel for a fantastic achievement!

Celia Britton shares her beach shelter snapshots

Hove Stories: The Beach Shelters For some time now I have been taking photos of people using the beach shelters at the bottom of Grand Avenue: young, old, residents, visitors, families, couples and solitary rough sleepers – their diversity constantly surprises me. Most of them are enjoying themselves, but some give a sense of loneliness and hardship that we perhaps do not often associate with Hove. Then when I realised that the shelters were right beside the site of the plinth, I imagined them all in the future sitting admiring the new sculpture! Celia Britton

Discussion Forum: The King Alfred Development

Our 2016 discussion forum provided an opportunity to hear directly from the team who have been chosen by the Council to develop the plans they submitted for the creation of a new leisure centre on Hove seafront. Like previous proposals for the King Alfred site, the leisure centre will be part of a larger development consisting of flats, open spaces, community facilities and retail outlets.

Public consultation will take place over the coming year and our meeting was a preview for invited guests only. Invitations went out to all members of Hove Civic Society, the Regency Society and Hove Business Association. There were over fifty people in the audience as well as a large panel of representatives from the Starr Trust, Crest Nicholson and two groups of architects. Below is a summary of the talks and discussion, and images can be viewed by following links at www.starrtrust.com.

Rob Starr introduced the members of the panel and spoke of the confidence he has in the development partnership, which has come together through a shared vision for the project.

Central to this is the concept of the leisure centre as part of a community hub for sport, creative arts and education. Rob intends that the enterprise will always be linked to the charitable activities of the Starr Trust.

Neil Dawtry, Crest Nicholson’s senior project director, presented his overall view of the development, emphasizing its sensitive position on Hove seafront. He showed images of similar work by Crest Nicholson, illustrating the company’s belief in the importance of the public realm and experiences of working in partnership

with the public sector. All the examples were of mixed de-velopments combining residential, retail and leisure uses.

Steve Tompkins from Haworth Tompkins, the architectural group responsible for the overall design, presented their outline plans for the positioning and scale of buildings and spaces. He told us that the architects are committed to listening to views and suggestions from members of the public over the coming year as plans develop from this outline.

He spoke of the significance of this development for the city: a brilliant leisure centre within an overall design that will complement, in a contemporary way, the buildings and public spaces along the seafront. The design is intended to enable public life by prioritising people, spaces and community facilities.

Many principles of architectural design came across during Steve’s presentation, and some were picked up by members of the audience during the discussion.

The architect Mike Lawless spoke on behalf of LA Architects who are prize-winning specialists in the design of leisure centres, and have responsibility for this part of the development. He explained how their outline plans are based on public experiences of using leisure centres, and the intention to create facilities and surroundings that will be a joy to use regularly.

They will be comfortable, airy and bright spaces in which to spend time. There was a lively question and answer session about key features, and Mike re-iterated the importance of the consultation period.

Computer images showing what the pool and gym may look like at the new King Alfred

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Rob Starr and the HCS Chairman, Helmut Lusser, thanked the panel and led into the discussion period. Here is a sample of some of the questions from the audience and the responses from members of the panel:

Theatre, health centre, library, gallery and the retail units?

All these suggestions for the use of indoor and outdoor space had been talked about over the previous months as a decision about the site became more likely. Flexible indoor spaces are intended to cater for a range of community activities, and a performance space with up to 250 seats will be possible when required.

There was a consensus in this meeting, supported by the development team as future landlords, that priority will be given to local, independent businesses.

Style and positioning of the residential blocks?

The sale of 565+ fl ats will be required to fi nance the development. Steve explained the reasons for placing the highest building, an 18-storey tower, in the south west corner of the site, and how the heights of buildings will fall towards Kingsway, and from west to east.

Swimming pools with windows facing Kingsway?

The architects intend that the bright lights from the pools will enliven the facade along Kingsway, and that a combination of north-facing natural light and bright interior top-lighting can best create illumination to the bottom of the pools.

Concerns were raised about privacy and the legal requirements to protect children if they were to be visible from outside the buildings. However, not all the windows will be transparent and pools used by children will always be shaded from public view.

What percentage of the area of the site will be occupied by residential blocks? Car parking space?

Public transport?

Figures were given for the ratio of areas, but not recorded on this occasion. This is clearly a fundamental question, which will emerge when the consultation increases, and 3D models are produced. There will be underground car parking for residents and for users of the leisure centre. Discussions have begun with bus companies as well as with regional transport authorities.

Materials and colouring on the outsides of buildings?

The aim is not to replicate any of our historical styles but to use materials that are durable in the face of weather conditions, and environmentally sustainable. The architects have ideas for combinations of materials and colours and await suggestions from the public.

Our meeting has provided a basis for participation during the public consultation period. There are questions in my mind and points were raised during the presentations that were not developed during the discussion.

Hove Civic Society will encourage our members to contribute to representations that the Society will make during the formal planning process.

Clare Tikly

Rob Starr (far right) and the Crest Nicholson team

HCS winter lecture programme

All lectures will take place in The Courtlands Hotel beginning at 7pm.

*please note that confi rmation of the date of the AGM will be circulated in good time.

27th October (tbc) AGM with Peter Kyle MP

24th November Mark Perry Nash, “John Nash and the Royal Pavilion”

26th January 2017 Ben James, “Sussex War Heroes” (tbc)

23rd February Bill McNaught, “The Brunels – Father and Son”

23rd March Dr. Sue Berry, “City Churches in Brighton and Hove”

27th April Discussion Forum

Each lecture will be publicised in more detail in the news-letter and by email.

With thanks to members who suggested some of the topics and speakers.