In September 2007 to celebrate the bicentenary of the Abolition of the Transatlantic Slave Trade, Harewood House staged a production of Carnival Messiah a huge spectacular theatrical event. It’s creator was Geraldine Connor a theatre director, educationalist and musician from Trinidad.

Harewood’s David Lascelles was the executive producer and instigator in bringing Carnival Messiah to Harewood “We wanted to acknowledge our history but at the same time to celebrate the present, I don’t know of any more exuberant, more spectacular, more inclusive expression of contemporary Caribbean culture than Carnival Messiah.

Carnival Messiah 

Carnival Messiah is a radical reinvention of George Fredrick Handel’s Messiah the production fuses together traditional and contemporary music, dance and carnival practices.  The idea came from Geraldine’s desire to celebrate both her Caribbean and British roots.

It was first created with students at Bretton Hall, Leeds University where Geraldine was a lecturer and then performed at the West Yorkshire playhouse in 1999 and then in Trindad in 2003 and 2004.

The 2007 the production at Harewood House was performed over two weeks in a big top tent in the grounds of the Harewood Estate.  With a cast of over a 100 community performers from Chapeltown, Leeds and legendary international artists.

Now a cultural landmark in both Leeds and the Caribbean, Carnival Messiah set the tone for what would become Geraldine’s enduring legacy, one of equality, diversity, empowerment, and inclusion in society through the Arts.

Geraldine Connor Foundation

After Geraldine Connor died prematurely in 2011, an arts organisation was established to continue her legacy.

The Geraldine Connor Foundation Geraldine’s works with people from all backgrounds to develop creative projects. Core to GCF’s work is the creation of opportunities in the Arts for talented young performers from diverse and challenging backgrounds. GCF’s creative projects cover the widest possible spectrum of art forms, and the organisation’s unique events and performances aim to enrich people’s lives.

Ultimately, GCF seeks to grow the family which Geraldine herself was at the heart of; a family of individuals whose lives were changed by her intense creative energy, her ability to see potential in people and her enormous generosity of spirit.

gcfoundation.co.uk

 Carnival Messiah The Film

To celebrate 10 years since Carnival Messiah was last performed at Harewood House a film of the production has been created. Ashley Karrell the film maker was a friend and mentee of Geraldine’s and directed this lasting legacy.

The full version of the film can be seen as part of Leeds International Film Festival on Tuesday 7^th November, 8.15pm at Leeds Town Hall for tickets please contact leedstownhall.co.uk

This year, Harewood House and grounds are taking a closer look at the Victorian era inspired by ITV’s period drama Victoria, which used Harewood as a major location. Although when the young Princess Victoria visited Harewood in 1835, the Bird Garden had not yet been built, (opening some 135 years later!), the era still had a major influence on the zoo you can see today.

It was during this period that animal collections and scientific study of the natural world began to develop. Zoological collections in Britain were beginning to evolve with menageries of species kept for display and travelling circuses full of dangerous and exotic animals becoming more common place.

The Zoological Society of London (ZSL) was founded in 1826, shortly before Victoria’s coronation (1837 – 1901). As a leader in the field, ZSL’s aim was to promote the study of animals and their ecology, an ambition which remains at the heart of zoological collections today. London Zoo officially opened its gates to the public in 1828, giving people the opportunity see animals from across the world and learn more about exotic species.

The Victorians were pioneering in promoting research, discovery and conservation of the natural world and organisations founded at the time are still of great importance and relevance today. In the later part of Victoria’s reign, the Plumage League was founded (1889) by Emily Williamson, to combat the killing of birds to use their feathers as fashion accessories. She later joined forces with the Fur and Feather League (1891) to create the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB), now a leading light in avian conservation across the world.

The era saw unparalleled developments in our understanding of the natural world with great naturalists such as Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace making discoveries that would fundamentally change how we perceive the world around us.

Since 1970, the Bird Garden at Harewood has promoted an understanding of birds and their environment through conservation, preservation and education, very much as the pioneering zoologists of the Victorian times had done. Today, we host a number of research projects each year with students coming from Askham Bryan College, Leeds Beckett University and University of Leeds among others. Studies on the Chilean flamingos, Humboldt penguins and our wide range of pheasants are either published in journals, ongoing, or in the process of being completed. These projects are all focussed towards improving the husbandry and welfare of the animals in our care. We often receive correspondence from other universities and zoos asking us to assist with projects, the results of which could be put towards the protection of birds and their natural habitats.

We recently welcomed a pair of Omei Shan Liocichla, a small Chinese songbird, to the Bird Garden. This species is listed being vulnerable to extinction in their native habitat and have been incorporated into a European Studbook which will help their ongoing survival.

With this addition, Harewood Bird Garden now partakes in 12 coordinated breeding programmes and species monitors, with 16 of the species kept in the Bird Garden classified as threatened on the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s Red List of endangered species. These can be seen living with another Chinese species, the silver pheasant in the aviaries below the crane paddocks.

In the neighbouring aviary we have two new red billed blue magpies from Nepal. These are striking blue birds with long striped tails. They have settled in very well and are currently nesting, with two eggs as I write this.

Another of our European Breeding Programme species is the palm cockatoos. These charismatic black birds with their bright pink cheeks have laid an egg again this year, the third year in succession making them the one of only two breeding pairs in the UK. The last two eggs have been successfully reared and we hope for a repeated performance again this year from our confident young family.

For those of you who want to know more about the Bird Garden and to support our ongoing conservation work, there are great opportunities you can access. From Bird Adoption to penguin feeding or our brand new Junior Keeper Experience launched this season, your support helps us to continue our charitable work, maintain and developing Harewood for the public benefit.

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Thank you.

A poem for Harewood’s Axminster carpets

The acclaimed poet Rommi Smith has written a new poem in response to Harewood House Trust’s on-going reassessment of its historic Axminster carpets and as part of a partnership with Leeds University’s Yorkshire Year of the Textile programme.

These unique carpets have survived since the late 18th century and were specifically commissioned for the Music Room and Yellow Drawing Room –  both designed by the architect Robert Adam. They are very rare examples of carpets still shown in the original rooms that they were designed to compliment.

Rommi Smith wrote the poem Notes for an Axminster Carpet and performed it here on the 20^th May 2017 accompanied by the composer and musician Jenni Molloy.

The poem is composed of a short series of imagined notes as if written by Robert Adam, to Thomas Whitty, proprietor of the Axminster Factory, Devon, where the carpets originated from.

The poems make reference to classical motifs that can be seen in the rooms for which the carpets were specially created and to historical notes written about the carpets and their rooms.

These poem-notes, could be considered directorial, almost theatrical, notes from Adam to Whitty. The poem, in homage to the carpets, is also site-specific, therefore, each section of the poem should, ideally, be read in the location for which it was written and intended to be performed.

Notes for an Axminster Carpet
By Rommi Smith

 ‘I was surprised to find such a little paltry place the origin of so much magnificence. The manufactory is all the property of one man. The work is chiefly done by women […] They were then employed in weaving a large carpet for Lord Harewood, late Mr Lascelles, which was to cost one hundred and forty pounds.’ – Reverend ED Clarke on his visit to the Axminster factory, 1791.

‘I […] had engaged myself for tomorrow […]’ Robert Adam, London: June, 7, 1788.

Note 1: Hallway

Mr. Thomas Whitty, Proprietor

Axminster Factory

Silver Street

Devon

England

 

Dear Sir,

please accept –

these notes for an Axminster carpet.

I send them, accompanied by these drawings,

not so much directions, but as artefacts of longing:

what we make of the moment

we leave for the pleasure of tomorrow.

 

Envisage (if you will), a hall

beyond the grounds that time will anoint

with Capability’s hands,

where a man might stand

as though he were the first at all;

 

my namesake; a song of alabaster:

earth-footed, yet jubilant face in heavenward devotion

to the firmament scored with stars on staves of Hallelujah.

 

This, then, Sir is the music, this is the pitch

from which this first note for the design emerges.

 

Note II: The Terrace

Vista our trade, desire our bread –

these are the dreams from which to craft the threads:

the earth the warp, the sky the weft

with which to divine Nature’s Carpet.

 

Note III: Yellow Drawing Room

To the tune of yellow silk (colour of July, or a midday

Badian sun) this carpet must succumb.

It will have a central, circular medallion

containing a bloom-head encased in anthemion

set into the heart of a four-pointed star.

Behind it, unfurling acanthus,

within dusk-rose and olive chain –

rosette borders, panels at each end.

 

This, Sir, will be the design, complimented

by the clean, yet ostentatious lines

of Mr. Chippendale’s imagination.

Note IV: The Music Room

At its heart, a central motif extending out

into a parasol of dawn-pink and spring leaves,

til the ‘unheard melodies’ of lyres,

which take their pitch from an Italian-green universe,

where large planets of rosette are circled by constellations

of light. The edges of this galaxy form an outer pole and ribbon stripe.

 

Carpet should be to ceiling – as earth is to sky.

With this carpet, one should expect

to better understand why we bury a man

in order for his soul to rise

and occupy the glory of a place in heaven –

 
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yours sincerely,

Mr. Robert Adam.

 

As you may know, Harewood House has been used as a major set for ITV’s flagship period drama “Victoria”. Throughout the first series, the production saw Harewood transformed into Buckingham Palace and Kensington Palace. The programme was viewed by over 7 million people here in Britain and has also been broadcast in over 100 countries worldwide. Series two is currently being filmed across Yorkshire and between the 17th May – 20th May Harewood will once again become Buckingham Palace. This will cause some changes to visitor access to the House.

To allow the film crew to transform Below Stairs of Harewood House into the kitchens and corridors of Buckingham Palace, we will close Below Stairs during the 17th – 20th May. Access to the Terrace Gallery, Terrace Café and Gavin Fernandes’ exhibition, The Empire Line, will still be possible on 17th, 19th and 20th May.

On 18th May, the film crew are using the southern exteriors of the House. The Terrace will be used so access to this garden and all areas of Below Stairs will not be possible. The State Floor will close slightly earlier, with last admission at 3pm.

To ensure that you can enjoy all of the House, we will be opening the State Floor to all visitors on the 17th May – 20th May at no additional cost. This will allow you to see the magnificent rooms and the Victorian Harewood exhibitions. There will be some disruption to rooms on the State Floor on the 19th May as the Main Library is prepared for filming. Please talk to the team and refer to visitor information when you visit.

Filming generates vital income for Harewood and it makes a significant difference to the charity. We would like to thank all our visitors in advance for their patience and we hope that you enjoy seeing the House being used by a large film production like “Victoria”.

Springtime in the gardens at Harewood means colour. Lots and lots of colour! From the dazzling display of tulips in the borders, alongside masses of hyacinths on the Terrace, down through the West Garden and all the way around the lakeside woodlands.  Here, swathes of daffodils cover the thickly wooded slopes in between groups of stately rhododendrons.

But there is always more than meets the eye at Harewood. Linger in those verdant glades a while longer. Take the time to stroll. Pause and look beyond those perennial showstoppers. Look closer. Look up, even look behind you, and you might be rewarded with a glimpse of something special. Whether it’s the billowing clouds of pure white cherry blossom against the blue sky, or the eerily striped hood of a cobra lily rising from the woodland floor, or a colony of orchids growing on a mossy roof, the richness and diversity contained within these gardens is staggering.
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And that’s just what’s in store for visitors now. Things are only starting to get interesting. Because for gardeners, springtime, of course, means more than colour. It means growth and renewal. It also means a lot of hard work. Harewood is very much a developing garden. We’re busy planting some amazing plants, many of which visitors will see flowering in the gardens this summer, while some will put on growth and then flower next spring, and there are others that may take some years to reach flowering size. The important thing for us is continuity – evolving the gardens through the constant addition of new plants. Enjoy the gardens this spring!