21 Oct 2011
MICHELIN CHEF MIXES IT AT THE MILL
The National Trust may not have a restaurant, tea-room or even a kitchen at Bembridge Windmill but what it did have last week was a Michelin Chef. As a result of a Twitter conversation struck up between Windmill Custodian Kathryn Wilson and Robert Thompson of the Hamborough in Ventnor, Robert spent a morning at the windmill sharing his passion and enthusiasm for bread and baking with children from Bembridge Primary School. With his only protection from the elements being the Trust’s small gazebo, Robert soon had the children mixing and kneading different types of bread explaining each stage in a fun and lively manner. The children really enjoyed the hands-on nature of the activity as well as tasting a selection of bread and scones which Robert had made earlier together with cream and jam.
Bembridge Windmill is the only surviving windmill on the Isle of Wight and one of the Trust’s smaller places. It is no longer in working order but is a much loved feature in the village community and the Trust is very grateful to Robert for giving up his time to help local children make the connection between the windmill, milling and the bread they eat each day. And who knows? He may even have inspired one of them to become a future Michelin starred Chef.
Visit Robert Thompson at http://www.robert-thompson.com/
23 June 2011
Celebrating 300 years of history & 50 years with the National Trust
Bembridge Windmill, one of the National Trust’s smallest places and the Isle of Wight’s only surviving windmill celebrated 300 years of history and 50 years with the National Trust on Sunday 19 June.
The occasion was marked by a Community Day which was attended by over 650 people – more than double the number hoped for. As well as free entry to the windmill there were displays and demonstrations in the adjoining field provided by the countryside team including hurdle making and a bug hunt but it was the shearing of the Trust’s black Hebridean sheep which proved the most popular with each session attracting large crowds.
Hurdle making
The Needles Old Battery tearoom provided a cake stall and 3 local organisations were invited to participate: Bembridge Women’s Institute, the Red Squirrel Trust and Bembridge Heritage Society. The latter helped collect recollections from visitors about the windmill’s past in a memory book provided especially for the occasion. A stall was also manned by the IW Association of National Trust Members which has recently provided funds for a hand quern which has been installed inside the mill for visitors to use.
The Community Day was the culmination of a week long celebration based around an Art Challenge where visitors were challenged to produce a piece of art inspired by and at the mill, in a maximum of four hours. The entries were displayed on Sunday together with pictures presented by the local Rainbow Guides and a selection of poems written for the anniversary by the boys’ literary class at Bembridge Primary School.
The art challenge was judged by Peter Jones, President of Bembridge Arts Society, Kathryn Wilson Custodian at Bembridge Windmill and Heather Bradshaw Assistant Property Manager for the Trust on the island.
Heather Bradshaw said ‘we are really pleased by the number of people who came and supported this event. It was a true community event, in every sense of the word - a fitting tribute to this small windmill which served the community of Bembridge for more than 200 years’.
Two of the judges with the winning entry in the adult category
Art challenge winners:
Adult:
1st Roy Lovejoy, Whippingham
2nd Janet Milne, Bembridge
3rd Charlotte Hodge-Thomas, Bembridge
4th F Sutters, Bembridge
Junior:
1st Harriet Mack, Ventnor
2nd Georgina Mack, Ventnor
13 April 2011
SPACE ACTIVITIES LAUNCHED AT THE NEEDLES NEW BATTERY
With the help of a grant from the West Wight Landscape Partnership the first hands on activities for children have just been installed in the rocket exhibition at the Needles New Battery.
The talking map and magnetic jigsaw were created by Science Projects Ltd of Acton, London who took some basic ideas from Trust staff and turned them into two innovative ways of bringing the place to life for younger visitors, within the constraints of the site, which can be damp, cold and open to the elements.
The talking map uses the 1950s site plan as the basis for explaining what happened in each area. When the plastic handset, rather like a stethoscope, is placed on the map, a voice explains what that place was used for when rockets were being tested on the site during Britain’s Cold War ‘race for space’.
The magnetic jigsaw enables children to build their own rockets, vehicles or satellites rather than being constrained by a template, which they can then place on the backdrop of the former rocket site, to create their own individual picture.
The activities were installed just in time for the start of the Easter school holidays and have already attracted a lot of use.
The Needles New Battery is open daily during school holidays from 11am – 4pm and on Tuesdays, Saturdays & Sundays at other times (until 30 October). There is no admission charge to the New Battery.
Dec 2010
CELEBRATING VOLUNTEERING
Freshwater Bay House with its spectacular view over the bay was the setting for the National Trust’s annual volunteers’ get-together last Friday, with more than 80 volunteers attending the afternoon event. As a charity the National Trust relies on its team of volunteers in all areas of its work – including meeting and greeting visitors at the Needles Old Battery, Mottistone Manor Garden and Bembridge Windmill, assisting the wardens in the countryside, providing guided tours at Bembridge Fort and helping with administration at the office.
NT Property Manager, Tony Tutton, thanked everyone for their support throughout the season and presented long service awards to those achieving 5, 10 and 15 years. A special presentation was made to Dorna Grove-Smith who has volunteered for the National Trust for 25 years. Dorna was presented with a paperweight and received a letter of thanks from the Trust’s Director General Dame Fiona Reynolds.
04 June 2010
AIR SOURCE HEAT PUMP GENERATES INTEREST
If you’ve ever wondered what an air source heat pump is, then come along to the Needles Old Battery and find out more. Earlier this year, in partnership with Npower, the National Trust installed a Dimplex air source heat pump to replace an old oil fired boiler which was both inefficient and expensive to run, as well as being unsuitable for such an environmentally sensitive site as the Needles headland. Local island contractors were employed to install the pump and to carry out improvements to the thermal performance of the building: new energy efficient radiators with controllable thermostats, insulation work to the ceilings of the tea room building and secondary glazing.
Once fitted, the only indication that there is an air source heat pump is a grey grill in the external wall of the building but visitors to the Old Battery have shown so much interest in it as it something that can be used in private homes that steps are being taken to make the actual pump system visible.
The pump, which works on a reverse refrigeration principle, by taking air in and extracting the heat from it, provides all the hot water for the tea room kitchen as well as the heating in the Port War Signal Station (tea room and exhibition building) and has proved so effective that on some days it needs to be turned right down.
The majority of the cost was paid for from the National Trust’s Npower Green Energy Fund with a smaller amount being received from the island’s A.O.N.B Sustainable Development Fund. As Paul Rayner, Building Surveyor with the National Trust says: "This is the first stage in a longer plan to reduce fossil fuel dependence and energy consumption at the Needles and throughout all of our properties. We are now planning to install a solar PV array at the Needles Battery (subject to appropriate consents) which will offset electrical usage further. On the brightest, sunniest days when we get a lot of visitors using the superb catering facilities at the Battery the solar panels will quietly sit and give us free energy.
We can all make reductions in our energy usage with simple lifestyle changes and some basic measures such as improved loft insulation can make a big difference and the there is a small exhibition at the Battery designed to inspire our visitors with ideas they can try at home. The Needles project shows what fantastic things can be done using available funding sources and measures sensitive to the type of building in question."
This is only one small but important part of the Trust’s partnership work with Npower and more can be found out by visiting the Trust’s website at: www.nationaltrust.org.uk or http://www.ntgreenenergy.org.uk/
30 March 2010
RE-CHARGING THE BATTERY
The Needles is much more than just rocks as visitors will discover this year when they go into the Cartridge Store at the Old Battery which has undergone a transformation this winter as phase one of our new and exciting interpretation project.
Most people’s first thought on hearing the words ‘the Needles’ is of the iconic rocks and the lighthouse and indeed it is this view, one of the most photographed on the Isle of Wight, which attracts many visitors to the Old Battery. So having first captured our audience it seemed a good opportunity to add to their visit by ‘bringing the Battery to life’. We couldn’t afford to station a garrison there, but we have taken a first small step by recreating a section of the Cartridge Store to look as it would have done in the 1880s.
What seemed like a simple idea to be implemented by a small group of 5 (3 members of staff and 2 volunteers), soon mushroomed involving several visits to Fort Nelson at Portsmouth and frequent consultations with the Chairman of the Palmerstonian Fort Society over the finer details of Victorian soldiery. The volunteers also visited the Records Office at Kew gaining even more information and everything has been recreated to be as historically accurate as possible.
The more we are learning, the more we want to find out and we see this very much as phase one of our interpretation project.
It’s not often you get the need to Google cordite in the course of a normal working day which is what makes working for the Trust so interesting and hopefully our visitors will also have a more interesting visit. The view of the rocks will still be there (unless it is foggy) but they should now begin to discover why the Battery is there and what is was used for.
