Events
Visits are announced and details displayed at our monthly meetings; bookings with payment are taken at the meetings.

Visits and Trips
Although popular there was a somewhat disappointing take up in 2009 one visit had to be cancelled and several others only had twenty plus members on the coach, the Committee decided to reduce the number of trips in 2010.

We have tried to link visits to the lectures, hence the trip to Salisbury Cathedral in April and the overseas trip to Barcelona in September when we will be able to see some of Gaudi’s work.

A party of 34 members had a delightful day in Salisbury in April– starting with a guided tour of the Cathedral by two very knowledgeable guides (one of whom is a NADFAS lecturer) followed by lunch in the Refectory at the Cathedral and then visiting Mompesson House in the Cathedral precincts. Visits to Slyfield House and Parham House were made in May and both were very well received,thanks to the informative guides at each house.

We retained the three perennial visits: Slyfield House on Sunday 9th May, the London Walk on Monday 5th July visiting Fishmongers Hall, and the Stanley Picker House Gallery on Wednesday 14th July as these had strict limits on the number of visitors. Such was the interest in visiting Highgrove House Gardens,we arranged two trips in August.

Our short haul trip in June took us to Liverpool and Chester with Bowens Coaches. We stayed at the Adelphi Hotel in the centre of the City and had a full programme of visits to galleries, the two cathedrals and Sunday afternoon in Chester. To break the journey we visited National Trust properties at Wightwick Manor and Upton House, with special guided tours at each venue.

The 2011 short and long haul trips will be to Lincoln and Berlin - further details in due course.

Visits Organiser.
John Tiffney - Visit Organiser

Members reports on visits
Quick links - The Purcell Singers - Waddesdon Manor - Durham -
Stanley Picker House/Gallery

Report of visit to the Stanley Picker House
In July a small party made what is becoming an annual visit to the Stanley Picker House and Gallery on Kingston Hill. This superb modernist house built in the late 50s retains the furniture, decoration and fittings of the time and remains at was when Mr Picker died. Set in landscaped gardens with contemporary sculpture and water features, the house is a little known gem open only by prior appointment. The owner was an eclectic collector of paintings and sculpture. There are two small exhibition galleries with art dating from pre-Roman to the 1960s; pieces not in the galleries are displayed throughout the house and gardens. Our tour guide, Mike Smith a lecturer from Kingston University, was full of interesting and personal anecdotes about many of the artists whose work was on show. Even some of those most sceptical of modern art were fascinated by the visit... but have they really changed their minds?
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John Cook