Recent Issues in Conservation - Silver Hill
and Northington Grange - TrustNews Dec 06
Report on a talk given by David Brock of English Heritage following the September AGM
The forthcoming white paper on conservation is likely to focus on the extent to which the government can exert control over environmental matters, with the aim of clarifying issues affecting planning for historic environments. Current confusion includes, for example, the fact that power exists to require the repair of listed buildings but not of ancient monuments.
In the course of his career David had seen a change from an attitude of saying "No" to one of offering advice rather than compulsion. He explained that understanding is the key to what conservation is about. When a complicated site is considered for conservation, more than one form of value and significance come into play.
If as he suggested the concept of a 'historic environment' must embrace the whole environment around us, then the decision has to be made as to what should or should not be done to this environment. Some parts will be more critical than others. Change is inevitable and we have to justify any defence of the historic environment.
Looking at Northington Grange, he outlined the complicated history of this Greek revival style building of the 17th century, re clad in cement render in the 19th century. In the 1980s one façade of the 17th century building was restored while buildings next to the main part of the house which had been demolished were not restored. The ruins remain to record the architecutral history but a cementrendered wall without windows was built to reunite the house with its conservatory.
Turning to Silverhill he said that some people regarded this part of the city as not being part of the historic town despite being within the old city walls. He asked what part of this area the people of Winchester wanted to retain and questioned the assumption that the area is worthy of having the old grid street pattern extended into it - in a sense re-Romanising it.
He thought the sheer bulk of the proposed scheme seemed to be the main issue, some of the buildings being six stories high in a seemingly unbroken mass. But the view from St. Giles' Hill already includes car parks and high-rise buildings of a similar height. The development would be a step change in the bulk of Winchester but not such a leviathan as some considered it to be. He said that this might be due to people's conception of what Winchester is - a city or a country town. Finally he asked whether, in interpreting the terms of their brief, the architect and developers might have gone too far. He felt that these were all questions to be answered by the local community.
Proceeding to wider conservation principles covering
- the historic environment as a shared resource
- the need to understand and sustain what is valuable
- managing places to sustain their significance
David stressed the need to judge how valuable and how vulnerable things are to particular types of change and to reconcile the significance of conflicting pressures for change. Decisions prompted by change must be reasonable and transparent. The weight of any decision should be proportionate to the significance of its value to society. For example, in Silverhill, the decision on car parking needs to be transparent.