In 2012/13, despite the bad weather and recession, the Trust continued to grow and prosper. Member numbers grew and legacies were stronger than last year. Volunteer numbers rose to 70,494. This is all support for which we are very grateful. Visitor numbers were marginally down at 19.2 million compared to 19.4 million in 2011/12. This is the second highest number in the Trust’s history.
While we did not meet our ambitious financial Net Gain target1 we did better than might have been expected in a summer historically wet and a recession historically deep. All in all we had a good year in difficult circumstances.
We must not be complacent. The conditions in 2013/14 look as challenging. The heritage and leisure sectors are expanding and becoming more competitive and the weather continues to drive people abroad. We need to keep spending on conservation and to convey the excitement and value of this work to our visitors.
The Board and I were delighted to appoint Dame Helen Ghosh as our new Director-General last year. Helen’s credentials for the role are second to none and she has already grasped the challenge. Bringing our properties to life, getting more out of the countryside, developing events programmes at properties, removing cumbersome processes – these must be our focus in the coming year.
Recession has affected not only our own operations. An increasing number of local authorities and other owners of historic properties are under pressure. The Trust remains a custodian of last resort, but we can and do offer help in other ways, through advice and partnership. This year partnerships came into operation at Eyam Hall in Derbyshire and, under long-term leases, at Tredegar House and Dyffryn House and Gardens in Wales. We are also jointly marketing a number of London museums.
The Trust’s chief concern on a wider orbit has been the threat to Britain’s landscape. Town and country planning is currently in turmoil following the introduction of the Government’s new planning policy framework and its impact on unprotected rural land. The Trust has been dealing with a stream of development pressures, including High Speed 2, wind turbines and a proposed golf complex within the setting of the Giant’s Causeway World Heritage Site. We are not against development and are ourselves involved in a number of housing schemes. We recognise there are competing demands on the rural environment. But the National Trust was established to safeguard the beauty of the countryside. We will stay true to that mission.
It remains for me to acknowledge our debt to our members, donors, volunteers and staff. The National Trust is an independent Charity. It relies on your support. On behalf of the Board, I thank you.
Simon Jenkins
Chairman
17 July 2013
I had long been an admirer of the National Trust before joining as Director-General in November 2012. As a historian who has made a career in public service, a great deal of which was spent focusing on environmental issues, joining an organisation that has all these concerns at its core has felt like coming home. I am delighted to have the opportunity to lead it.
I have joined a thriving organisation in a strong position. We have more members than any other comparable organisation. We have a knowledgeable and committed staff, working with 70,494 skilled volunteers. Our finances, despite the recession, are sound.
In my first nine months, I have visited many of our properties around the country – from hard-hatted walks on scaffolding at Knole to viewing the peat restoration work of the Eastern Moors Partnership in the Peak District. I have talked to partners, journalists and ministers on topics ranging from World Heritage Site legislation to marine protection. The breadth of what the Trust does and the enthusiasm of our staff and volunteers have struck me.
But I have noticed that this enthusiasm is not well served by our overly complex systems and processes. These absorb people’s time and attention and hold back our potential. So one of my first priorities will be building the organisation’s capability: simplifying and improving our systems and processes to provide our property teams with the tools they need to look after our properties and serve supporters well.
Another priority is achieving everywhere the good management, good presentation and good interpretation that our members expect from the National Trust. I have seen some remarkable examples of conservation and some innovative approaches to interpreting our properties for visitors. But I have also seen some areas where we could improve both. We should talk more about the successes, and use the experience to raise the standard elsewhere.
The National Trust’s core purpose is simple: to look after special places for ever, for everyone. It is a virtuous circle: the money we receive from our generous supporters allows us to look after our properties so that visitors can enjoy them now and in the future. The Trust was born and grew because people from a range of backgrounds cared strongly about historic and beautiful places. We can never take that support for granted, so I would like to echo Simon’s words and say thank you to all of you who have helped us through a difficult year.
Dame Helen Ghosh
Director-General
17 July 2013
In this section, the Board of Trustees gives an overview of the National Trust’s activities and performance in 2012/13. These are explored in more detail, with case studies, in the subsequent sections.
Looking after more than 350 historic buildings, over 1,141 kilometres (713 miles) of coastline and 247,180 hectares of countryside for ever, while maintaining the financial strength of the Trust, is a serious responsibility.
In 2012/13 we spent £51.8 million on property conservation projects. This was lower than the £67.7 million we spent in 2011/12 because we delayed some projects to meet our annual budget constraints.
We measure how effectively we carry out our conservation work through the Conservation Performance Indicator (CPI). Last year, 100% of properties reviewed their CPI objectives and 78% reported an improving score.
Our largest property conservation project is taking place at Knole in Kent, a sprawling and striking Tudor home with a fine collection and among the most important historic houses in the country. Both the house and the collection are in a very poor state of repair. We have begun an £18 million project to restore the property, using pioneering conservation techniques.
Other major projects include the re-roofing of Castle Drogo in Devon, work to save and restore the Red Wing at Croome Park in Worcestershire, and investment to transform the estate surrounding Quarry Bank Mill in Cheshire.
Many of our acquisitions are incremental, adding to our existing holdings. This was the case with the major fundraising appeal for an area of the White Cliffs of Dover in Kent. Over 16,000 people helped us exceed our £1.2 million target in 133 days, allowing us to save this portion of the Cliffs for the nation.
Occasionally, the Board acquires a significant new addition to the portfolio. This year we were pleased to acquire Stoneywell, a beautiful Arts and Crafts cottage in Leicestershire, designed and built by Ernest Gimson.
Our managers are increasingly exploring arrangements other than acquisition. Most strikingly, this has included a new partnership at Eyam Hall in Derbyshire, where we are leasing management of the property from the owners.
New properties opening their doors this year included Nuffield Place in Oxfordshire, home to William Morris the car manufacturer, and 575 Wandsworth Road in London, home to Kenyan-born poet Khadambi Asalache who created its unique interiors.
The Trust delivers its obligation to provide public benefit through access to our properties. Visitor enjoyment is an important measure of how well we are fulfilling that obligation. In 2012/13 the percentage of visitors rating their visit as either ‘enjoyable’ or ‘very enjoyable’ on our visitor exit survey was at 97%.
However, there was a drop in the number rating the visit ‘very enjoyable’ from 67% in 2011/12 to 62% in 2012/13. In part, this was because of the weather, but there is some evidence we are not keeping pace with visitor expectations in all areas. This is something the Board will watch.
We were, however, pleased to note that member numbers continued to grow, to 3.94 million at the end of the year, as did our measure of member satisfaction – the Net Promoter Score2.
Volunteers are very important to us, so we were delighted that more people than ever chose to donate their time and skills – some 70,494 volunteers and groups contributing 3.77 million hours. We were also pleased that more volunteers than in previous years would strongly recommend their experience with us; a pleasing result because this has been a priority for us.
Overall staff satisfaction continued its upward trend but we are concerned that operational management satisfaction3 continued to trend downward. This is of concern because we use this indicator to measure whether general and property managers feel they have clear accountability, are provided with the authority and resources to do their job and believe that decisions are taken in a reasonable timescale.
The trend suggests this is not working as well as we would like and that more effort is required. We were glad to note the speed of management’s response to investigate the causes of this and to put remedies in place.
The Trust’s most important financial target is what we call Net Gain. This is explained in more detail in the financial review section (page 22) but, simply put, it is our version of operating profit from everyday activities (including short-term maintenance) and is put back into conservation.
We achieved an 8.2% net gain, equivalent to £23.9 million. This was only £2.2 million short of last year’s result4 against a background of very poor weather and continued recession which both had a material impact on our financial performance and our operating results.
The recession and bad weather meant that when people did visit, they spent less in our shops and cafés.
Adverse weather conditions also meant we made less progress in meeting our energy reduction target. A milder, wetter winter and a colder spring and summer meant more energy was needed to control humidity and temperature in our houses. This is a reminder that our 2020 target is a stretching one – reducing our total energy consumption by 20% against a 2009 baseline, irrespective of new acquisitions, buildings or the vagaries of the climate.
Thanks to strong marketing and our investment in Christmas events, performance was better later in the year. Visitor numbers for the full year were only marginally down on the previous year’s record number, at 19.2 million5. As the Chairman notes in his introduction, this was our second highest number of visitors ever.
There were other reasons for optimism. Membership numbers and income both grew last year. We ended the year with a net increase of 48,600 memberships, a 2.5% growth on the previous year and a £10.5 million, or 8.1%, rise in membership income. Member retention also improved, from 83.8% in 2011/12 to 84.2%. We ended the year in February 2013 with 3,938,248 members. Overall we were delighted with this continued growth during the recession.
We also had an income of £50.2 million from legacies, 12% higher than 2011/12.
Taken together, the strong contribution from legacies, unbudgeted contributions from project grants6 and an underspend on projects, the Board is happy to report, therefore, that the Trust’s finances end the year in a satisfactory position. We pay tribute to the hard work and resilience of our staff and volunteers in difficult circumstances.
In 2011/12 the Board authorised a public campaign to influence the Government’s draft of the National Planning Policy Framework for England. As a result of a well-run campaign, the Government published a more balanced final draft. We remain concerned about how this new framework will be implemented and are working with the Government, local authorities and communities to enable a sensible implementation.
The Trust is not against development and recognises that this sometimes comes at an environmental cost. However, there is a balance to be struck, requiring an effective mechanism to weigh the benefits of developments against their impacts.
Over the last year we have raised concerns about a number of major developments that will have an impact on our properties or their settings. We are extremely disappointed at the decision to allow the development of a golf complex within the setting of the Giant’s Causeway World Heritage Site in Northern Ireland. We joined with English Heritage and Northamptonshire County Council to appeal against the decision to build wind turbines within sight of Lyveden New Bield in Northamptonshire. On that occasion, our appeal was allowed and the planning inspector’s decision quashed.
We are engaging with Government, local communities and businesses and High Speed 2 Limited on the best way to mitigate the environmental impact on our properties of High Speed 2 Phases 1 and 2. We are objecting strongly to the Atlantic Array offshore wind farm, which would negatively impact the setting of Lundy Island, and we are very concerned about the Navitus Bay proposal in the Solent.
2012/13 was a challenging year but, encouragingly, visitor numbers were only marginally lower than the previous year and impressive relative to the previous five years.
The Board remains confident for the future. Membership and legacy growth continued and our supporters helped to secure the future of the White Cliffs and Knole.
The Board extends its thanks to everyone who continued to support us despite the weather and the recession, whether member, volunteer or donor. We cannot emphasise enough how grateful we are for their support.
2012/13 was a busy year which saw important property conservation work undertaken, improvement of visitor facilities, new acquisitions and continued involvement with wider issues, including planning proposals. The case studies below offer snapshots of these activities and acquisitions during the year.
Knole in Sevenoaks, Kent, is a unique piece of cultural history. Built as an archbishop’s palace and transformed into a lavish Jacobean house by the Sackville family, it is one of the largest houses in England. In 2012 the Knole team embarked on a long-term, two-part project to secure the future of Knole and its heritage, to transform the volunteering and visitor experience, and to help more people to connect with this special place.
The first phase of the project is ‘Knole in Flux’, a two-year essential repairs programme begun in 2012. The aim is to engage visitors and the local community with the challenges of conservation work at Knole and the changes that are currently taking place. A successful community evening was held with a graffiti wall for visitors to leave ideas and suggestions. Tours of the scaffolding have given visitors unparalleled access to building work and the chance to view Knole at chimney level, while the less adventurous enjoyed time-lapse photography of the scaffold construction. Inside the house, show rooms and collections that required protection remained open, and the creation of a giant polythene tunnel allowed visitors to explore the historic space in a new way and see the building repair work through purpose-built windows.
The volunteering offer was extended, creating new opportunities with the help of the existing volunteer team. Over 40 community volunteers helped to test new visitor routes, and the first major new volunteering project – ‘Knole Unwrapped’ – recruited new volunteers for a one-off experience to help clean and repack Knole’s stored collections.
The project team has also been finalising preparations for the second phase of the project –‘Inspired by Knole’. The ambition of this phase is to involve visitors with conservation, encouraging people to come and see the work being done to preserve Knole for the future. The aim is to raise over £3 million, and the team is now working with private donors following a successful public appeal.
A Round 2 bid has been submitted to the Heritage Lottery Fund for £7.8 million. Combined with Trust funds this will enable the team to build a conservation studio and learning centre, to create a new café, to open attic spaces and tower rooms to share more of Knole and its stories, and to re-present show rooms. By engaging communities and new and existing audiences in conservation work and future plans, Knole’s special qualities can continue to be enjoyed, celebrated and cherished.
The Trust has been looking after the Giant’s Causeway on the Northern Irish coast since 1961. The site was opened to the public in 1962 and in 1986 was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. In April 2000 a fire destroyed the visitor centre. The temporary facilities which replaced it were used for over a decade. This year a brand new visitor centre opened and is bringing to life the stories and the science behind the Giant’s Causeway.
An international architecture competition for the design of the new visitor centre was held in 2005 by the Government, and in 2008 the Trust took the lead in the development. The £18.5 million project was made possible through a range of funding sources, including the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment. The Northern Ireland Tourist Board awarded £9.3 million (of which £6.1 million came from the European Regional Development Fund) and the Heritage Lottery Fund awarded £3.0 million.
The new visitor centre, which was designed by Heneghan Peng architects, features 186 basalt columns. These were quarried from the same lava flow which formed the famous Causeway stones and were assembled on site by master masons. The design also features a grass roof which helps the building to integrate with the surrounding landscape, as well as encouraging the growth of indigenous species of grass and wildflowers. The building was awarded the accolade of best new sustainable building in the recent Sustainable Ireland awards. This is due to the innovative carbon-free heating and cooling system, the significant use of recycled products and the zero waste of stone.
Since opening on 3 July 2012, the new visitor centre has welcomed visitors from over 160 countries. Innovative, pocket-sized audio guides are available in a number of languages while the retail and catering facilities now feature a wide range of local products. As well as the new visitor centre, the Causeway team has upgraded existing paths and trails, providing all visitors with a spectacular cliff-top experience.
Eyam Hall in the Peak District has been owned by the Wright family since its construction in 1672. The family has leased the Hall to the Trust, and in March 2013 it opened to visitors under our management. The history of the Hall and the surrounding village is a fascinating and important one. In the 17th century, Eyam village was struck by plague and its inhabitants famously closed access to the village rather than risk spreading infection. We will be exploring ways to bring that story to life at the Hall.
Surrounded by four acres of gardens and set alongside 11 acres of SSSI7 woodland in Charnwood Forest in Leicestershire, Stoneywell is a rare surviving example of an Arts and Crafts cottage. It was designed and built by Ernest Gimson and has been in the continuous occupation of the Gimson family until now. A substantial archive and many of its original contents survive. In September 2012 the Trust launched a fundraising appeal to acquire Stoneywell. Further fundraising is now needed to enable the Trust to make repairs and put in visitor facilities so that this unique cottage can be opened to the public in 2014.
Following our successful Planning for People campaign in 2011, which influenced the Government’s proposals for planning reform, March 2012 saw the publication of the revised National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF). This year we are carefully monitoring the Government’s on-going reform of the planning process, how the NPPF is implemented and national plans for infrastructure investment.
Together with the Local Government Information Unit, we commissioned research to understand how local authorities were responding to the NPPF changes and in particular whether they had Local Plans prepared that reflected local needs for development. The research suggested that fewer than half of local authorities have adopted Local Plans within the 12-month timeframe given by the Government from NPPF publication – raising the risk of inappropriate development and planning by appeal.
We are opposing a number of planning proposals where we are concerned that there would be a threat to sites of historic importance, natural beauty or bring about environmental damage. We opposed proposals to build a golf complex next to the Giant’s Causeway in Northern Ireland, wind turbines near Lyveden New Bield in Northamptonshire, and expressed our considerable concerns around the development plans for the Atlantic Array offshore wind farm near Lundy Island in Devon.
We are working to reduce the environmental impact of the proposed High Speed 2 Phase 1 route. Whilst the Trust is neither for nor against High Speed 2 in principle, we object to the route where it impacts directly and indirectly on our properties, including Hartwell House near Aylesbury. We are working with local communities and other stakeholders, including High Speed 2 Limited, to develop alternative proposals.
It is clear is that we are dealing with a higher number of development threats to our properties or their settings than ever before.
Our strategy, agreed in 2006, is a balanced set of four objectives: engaging our supporters, improving conservation and environmental performance, investing in our people, and financing our future. Success is measured by a set of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs).
In 2012/13 our priorities were to improve visitor enjoyment by getting the basics of a good visitor experience right everywhere, and to increase the percentage of our volunteers who strongly recommend the Trust as a place to volunteer.
This year’s performance results are shown in the table below, and the next pages give an overview of our performance against those targets. Financing our future is covered in the Financial Review section on page 22.
Alongside the indicators, we have three major programmes that help deliver the strategy:
The pages following report on the activity that forms part of the Bringing places to life and Getting outdoors and closer to nature. The activity that formed part of the Performing at our Best programme came to an end in 2011/12 and so is not reported here. Please see the Annual Report 2011/12 for information about this programme.
We rely on our supporters and we could not do our work without them. Every time somebody visits, renews their membership, volunteers their skills or time, or makes a donation, they contribute to caring for the places they and we love. We want all our supporters to have a great experience with us so we build long and lasting relationships with them. Our aims last year were to improve visitor experience, improve volunteer recommendation, recruit and retain more members and improve our Net Promoter Score.
In 2012/13 we focused on improving visitor enjoyment by investing in the basics of a good visitor experience. Overall, we had 19.2 million visits to our pay-for-entry properties, which was our second best year ever. However, the percentage of visitors describing their visit as ‘very enjoyable’ fell from 67% in 2011/12 to 62% last year. This is the second year this measure has dropped. The poor weather is certainly part of the cause – but it is not the only factor. Our analysis suggests that visitors’ expectations are rising and we need to do more to keep up.
Although this is disappointing, it is worth noting that the combined total number of visitors rating their visit as either ‘enjoyable’ or ‘very enjoyable’ was 97%. Our challenge is doing that little bit extra that makes an excellent visit rather than simply a good one. We will continue to focus on this objective in 2013 and 2014, learning from properties that consistently score highly, listening to our visitors and what they expect, and investing more in interpretation.
Our 70,494 volunteers gave 3.77 million hours of their time last year, working in a range of roles from house and garden guides and volunteer rangers in the countryside to those helping us with social media and the website. We appreciate enormously the time and skills that they bring. Last year, we were concerned that the number of volunteers who would ‘strongly recommend’ their experience to others had remained static for a number of years. We wanted to see this increase because we want to make sure that volunteers derive as much from their time with us as we do from their expertise and knowledge.
We focused on getting the basics of volunteering right everywhere. We helped staff to organise and manage volunteers, have introduced a website for volunteers, called MyVolunteering, to improve communications with volunteers, and are experimenting with new, more flexible ways of volunteering. We are pleased to say that in the first year we saw a 4% improvement from 2011/12 to 63% in our volunteer recommendation score. This was just short of our target of 64%, so this remains a focus for 2013 and 2014.
Membership is a way for us to fulfil our core purpose and is very important to our financial sustainability: a growing number of members is a good sign of the organisation’s health. This year we were delighted to welcome over 757,000 new members to the Trust. During the summer of 2012 we again achieved over 4 million members. By the end of the year this had dropped to around 3.9 million members because of the usual seasonal fluctuations. In 2012/13 84.2% of memberships were renewed, in comparison with 83.8% the previous year.
Ultimately, our aim is to improve the benefits of membership. Free access and free car parks are a strong incentive, but there is more the National Trust can offer people to both join and stay as members – including sharing more opportunities to get involved in our cause and personalising communications to match people’s interests. Our Net Promoter Score demonstrates how strongly our members would recommend their membership14 so helps us understand how well we are achieving this. It rose from a score of 31% in 2011/12 to 34.5% in 2012/13, exceeding our target of 31%. We need to do more work to understand what influences this measure, but the improvement is an encouraging sign.
Looking after our properties to a world-class standard underpins everything we do. An excellent visitor experience and our ability to influence through good practice depends on high-quality property conservation. Last year we spent £79.7 million on property conservation and saw improvement in the condition of assets at 78% of our properties. Many of the case studies in this Annual Report focus on this work.
We undertake a wide range of conservation activities. In 2012 we achieved museum accreditation – the first step on the way to 150 properties achieving museum standard. We invested £7.2 million in improving our residential let estate, with major property development projects underway at West Wycombe in Buckinghamshire, Holnicote Estate in Somerset and Kingston Lacy in Dorset, amongst others. Working in partnership, we undertook major landscape-scale property conservation projects such as re-wilding Ennerdale in the Lake District and working to restore habitats in the Eastern Moors, Peak District. We also invested significant sums in major conservation works at Knole in Kent, Castle Drogo in Devon, and Mount Stewart in Northern Ireland.
Our Conservation Performance Indicator (CPI) continues to be the barometer for understanding where we can improve our property conservation. For the first time this year we have completed reviews at every property, showing that property conservation at 78% of properties is improving. While we missed our ambitious target of 85%, this has to be put in context: our first target when we began was only 20%. If we also add the 7% of properties that reported no change in their score, the picture is one of the Trust performing well while the external pressures from climate change and new diseases grow.
By 2020 we aim to have reduced our energy use by 20% based on a 2009 baseline and to have half of that supply coming from renewable sources.
We have made good progress in reducing our energy consumption, but that slowed last year and we achieved only a 4% reduction – less than the previous year and short of our 12% target. The wet, cool weather all year required more heating, while longer opening hours, increased access and new properties and buildings all contributed to energy consumption. Despite this, some properties managed significant reduction. We need to learn from them. In 2013 we will introduce nationally the environmental management system that helped our Wales team achieve a 33% energy reduction last year. This is a formal, independently assessed process which helps our teams know what they use in terms of energy, water and waste and then aim for annual improvements.
Over the last few years many of our properties have invested in wood-chip burners, solar panels, small-scale hydro schemes and other ways to produce energy on site. If we are to meet our 2020 commitment, we need to invest more strategically. In 2012 the Board of Trustees signed off a £3.4 million pilot investment in a handful of renewable schemes that will make a big difference to our energy generation and will contribute financially through feed-in tariffs (the money paid for contributing energy to the Grid). If the pilot is successful, we will explore further opportunities for investment.
We have over 5,000 staff and we take their welfare and training seriously. Every year our staff survey tells us how well we are performing in a range of areas, both nationally and for individual managers. We use that insight to shape our plans to invest in confident, capable managers and staff, ensuring that we have the skills and expertise to be able to look after special places for ever, for everyone.
Our staff satisfaction score rose for another year, beating the target by 2%. We measure staff satisfaction through an annual staff survey. Every manager is required to work with their team to develop an action plan to address any issues raised by their staff. This year’s survey results show us that we are doing well in motivating and developing our staff, helping them feel confident to do their jobs. But it also shows that we need to make decisions faster and continue to tackle bureaucracy. This will be a priority in 2013/14.
We completed the introduction of MYplace, a system that allows managers and staff to enter and update their own employment details. This is an important change because it replaces cumbersome paperwork with a ‘one-stop shop’, simplifying a previously time-consuming process. As with any major system change, there have been issues with implementation which we are now resolving.
This year we have focused on developing the skills of our property teams and volunteers to deliver an exceptional visitor experience consistently well. We know that confident, capable, customer-focused staff and volunteers are the most important factor in creating an enjoyable visit. We also continued to focus on developing the leadership skills of our managers, through our Future Engage and Deliver leadership programme. This management training programme aims to ensure our managers have the skills and confidence to lead their teams and deliver our plans.
Our aim is to delegate more authority, within a framework, to our general and property managers. We use our operational management satisfaction score to measure how empowered and supported they feel15. Last year, this fell from 69% to 62%. The Executive Team held a series of workshops around the country, speaking to all general and property managers and listening to their concerns. These ranged from improving delivery of central initiatives to simplifying core processes and improving services from support functions such as finance and information technology. As a result, we developed a seven-point action plan to address each of these areas, tracked by the Chief Operating Officer.
We also expect our major investment in overhauling our systems – the Systems Simplification Programme – to make it much easier for properties to do their jobs. Management information will be quicker and more accurate and tills easier to use and more integrated, removing many of the frustrations currently felt. This programme has only just begun and will be reported in full in the Annual Report 2013/14.
All of our special places are unique and we want to share their stories with our visitors in an imaginative and engaging way. Without compromising our duty of conservation, we want visits to our properties to be both informative and fun. The following case studies look at some of the best ways in which our properties have been doing this in 2012/13.
Wallington in Northumberland came to life last autumn with a series of promenade performances in the house. ‘Teacups, Zebras and Dancing Kaisers’ was an immersive theatrical experience created as part of a three-year programme to bring Wallington to life, and told the story of Sir Charles Philips Trevelyan who gave Wallington to the National Trust.
The performances took place in November 2012, at evenings and weekends. For each performance, three groups of visitors were led on different routes around the house to find out more about Sir Charles and his family, his decision to give the estate to the National Trust and the evacuees who stayed at Wallington during the Second World War.
The performances allowed visitors to go to parts of the house not normally open to the public. Tours were used as a way of finding out visitors’ views about how these rooms, including the attic and the west wing, should be presented to the public in future. A cast of professional actors, performing arts students, volunteers, Cambo School children, Wallington Pipers, local people and members of the donor family, accompanied visitors on their exploration of the house. Activities used to explore the stories of the house included original Trevelyan family games such as ‘Humpbacked Zebra’. The journey culminated in a tenants’ party in the Central Hall, where Sir Charles made an important announcement – his decision to give the estate to the National Trust.
The ‘Teacups, Zebras and Dancing Kaisers’ performances were a great success in presenting the house and the Trevelyan family in a different way and showed the power of site-specific productions. Two of the transformed spaces will remain, and the property team hopes to use room sets, sound and light, objects and costumed interpreters to open up additional parts of the house and continue to explain more of Wallington’s history to visitors.
A Georgian Italianate palace set in beautiful gardens, Ickworth House in Suffolk is full of stories and treasures. The life of those ‘downstairs’ is often hard to capture, but in March 2012 the property team opened the newly restored Servants’ Basement in the famous Rotunda. Known as Ickworth Lives, this inspirational project was made possible through use of documents, photographs and an extensive oral archive gathered at Ickworth over many years which recorded the memories of staff from the estate.
Ickworth Lives has returned the atmosphere of a bustling service area to the basement and focuses on the stories of the people who lived and worked at Ickworth. An exhibition and a 1930s silent film greet visitors as they descend to the basement. Photographs of staff who worked on the estate donated by friends and relatives are also on display. Guided tours are offered and enthusiastic, costumed volunteers demonstrate the tasks performed by regular domestic servants, including housemaids, hall boys and the cook. Every month the property team holds special ‘living history’ days to bring the stories of individuals to life.
In 2009 an old notebook listing the varieties of fruit and vegetables grown a century ago at Ickworth was discovered. The garden team is planning to use this to recreate the gardens as they were one hundred years ago.
Dunham Massey, near Altrincham in Cheshire, was home to the Booths and the Greys, respectively Earls of Warrington and Stamford. On 23 July 2012 the Ethiopian flag was flown from the Georgian house for the first time in over 30 years to mark the birthday of Emperor Haile Selassie, a life-long friend of Roger Grey, 10th Earl of Stamford. Inspired by Roger Grey’s desire to bring cultures together, the property team worked with volunteers from Manchester’s Rasta and Ethiopian communities to bring the history of the house to life through music, drama, poetry and the delicious taste and aroma of Ethiopian coffee.
This Earl and Emperor project included a traditional coffee ceremony on the front lawn and performances by the Beating Wings Orchestra, a music collective with membership from refugee and migrant backgrounds. A short film about the Earl and Emperor project is being made by BBC Inside Out and will be broadcast in autumn 2013.
Snowshill Manor, near the Cotswold village of Broadway in Gloucestershire, is full of unlikely treasures collected by Charles Paget Wade. The property team has been making these collections more accessible, developing an interpretation room in the cellar with labelled objects for visitors to handle and displays of original item receipts. The Manor is shown by timed ticket, but the team has created ‘invitations’ printed on handmade paper to give visitors a more personal welcome. A pest discovery was imaginatively used as an opportunity to re-present the Samurai sword collection, and sound effects and new lighting are used to give the Green Room a theatrical feel. Having seen the room full of bicycles, visitors are also able to try out Snowshill’s very own model penny-farthing.
Wray Castle, set on Lake Windermere’s western shore in Cumbria, came to the Trust in 1929 and until recently was tenanted. In Easter 2012 the unfurnished castle was fully opened to visitors for the first time, with families in particular encouraged to play in the castle, to explore and to imagine what life there had been like. The empty space was full of possibilities, and visitors were invited to get involved and tell the Trust what they would like to see and do. A pop-up café now provides drinks which can be taken around the castle or enjoyed on one of the many sofas. Following plenty of requests, adult-sized costumes are now available in the dressing-up rooms and can be worn throughout the visit, allowing the whole family to step back in time. The property team is also restoring some of the rooms to how they would have looked in the 1880s.
We believe passionately that getting outdoors and closer to nature is good for mind, body and soul. Our aim is to encourage and enable as many people as possible, of all ages and abilities, to enjoy our outdoor properties and learn more about nature. It means a radical re-think in how we promote our places and what we offer people when they get there. Last year was the second year of our outdoors programme, which we have divided into four separate objectives:
This section explores case studies in each area.
The experiences you have before the age of 12 are important in shaping what you value in the future. Our research shows that children in the 21st century have lost touch with the natural environment, with far fewer and poorer quality opportunities to access it than in previous generations. So our 50 things to do before you’re 11¾ campaign aims to restore that connection by creating enjoyable and accessible family activities in the outdoors.
Our list of 50 things, developed by National Trust staff, included skimming stones, making grass trumpets, building a den, catching a crab, camping wild and cooking on a campfire – activities with which many adults would be familiar. The campaign was launched in May 2012 to good media coverage, catching the imagination of parents and kids alike. We handed out over 350,000 scrapbooks and 278 of our properties took part. It proved popular – 92% of participants surveyed said they would recommend the event to others.
We are repeating the campaign in 2013, working with our new ‘Kids’ Council’ to update the list and match activities with the best places in the country to do them.
In October, we launched the Great British Walk, sponsored by PruHealth and building on the success of our 2011 walking festival. Throughout the October half-term, 399 properties held over 4,700 walking events for all ages and abilities. Because our aim was to encourage more people to enjoy the outdoors, we had a particular focus on families and on those who don’t walk often.
Events included short ambles, guided and self-led trails, and tramper trails for the less mobile. National Trust walking champions recommended their favourite walks, frames in the landscape captured stunning views, and night walks were held for stargazing. Nymans in West Sussex held a walking challenge to follow in the steps of plant collectors while Attingham Park, Shropshire, introduced a Second World War walk. Staff and volunteers participated in the Great British Walk Off – an internal event to see who could clock up the most miles in nine weeks. Simon Cranmer, property operations manager at Hatfield Forest, won with 451 miles.
Our outdoor programme aims to provide people with really engaging and inspirational experiences. Working with our partner Sport England, one way we are doing that is by increasing the number of outdoor sporting activities on offer at Trust properties. In doing so, we are conscious always of the importance of conserving the natural environment. The partnership, supported by a £500,000 grant from Sport England, was launched last year.
The spread of the activities around the Trust in the first year is impressive: from table tennis and volleyball at Attingham Park in Shropshire, to the Grasmere Gallop in Cumbria; from the ‘National Trust Gravity Rally’ (a semi-professional cycling event) at Holnicote Estate in Somerset, to rowing boats at Hatfield Forest in Essex; and from a new horse-riding route at Alderley Edge in Cheshire, to canine cross country at Woodchester Park in Gloucestershire. ‘Park Run’ has been introduced at many sites, including Killerton in Devon and Sheringham Park in Norfolk and Wimpole in Cambridgeshire. In January 2013, Wimpole had 292 runners at 9am on a Saturday morning for the first 5-kilometre run around the park. Many used the restaurant afterwards to refuel.
Plans for 2013 include a duathlon at Clumber Park in Nottinghamshire, the Tyntesfield Ten running event at Tyntesfield in Somerset, archery at Penrose in Cornwall, and the second year of our Hidden Peak Sportive cycling event in the Peak District.
When members and visitors come to National Trust land, their experience should be enhanced by the quality of conservation. But caring for such a large land holding, for ever, for everyone has a price. One of the aims of our outdoor programme is to generate more income from the outdoors, to allow us to offer more activities and improve our conservation. Camping is a major part of that.
Our campsite at Low Wray is on the western shores of Lake Windermere, with spectacular views of the lake and fells. The site has access to the water for canoeing and has walks to Hill Top and Wray Castle. Last year, we invested in improving the offer for customers at Low Wray, refurbishing the toilets and showers, converting existing buildings into a new visitor reception, and diversifying the offer with pods, tepees and yurts. From a position where the site was making a loss, the investment produced a net contribution to the Trust of £105,000 in 2012/13.
Low Wray is a great example of our triple bottom line approach to social, environmental and financial sustainability: more people having a better experience in the heart of Beatrix Potter country, providing the Trust with much-needed funds to help our conservation work elsewhere in the Lake District. We are always conscious that commercial concerns should not compromise access and conservation.
Our work in the outdoors simply wouldn’t be possible without the dedication and expertise of our staff and volunteer wardens and rangers. Offering more engaging experiences to our visitors often means changing how we work. One of the biggest changes is the shift from wardens to rangers – a change that signifies a move away from a focus on conservation to one focused on conservation and engagement.
The Lake District team has enthusiastically embraced the new way of working. The 64 rangers and ranger interns tweet, blog and have created a single website for the area: www.ntlakesoutdoors.org.uk. The team has also produced personalised ‘ranger guides’ at 10 places, celebrating walking, canoeing, cycling and nature. Dressed in snappy red branded clothing and driving branded vehicles, team members are easy to spot around the Lake District.
We are currently carrying out a review of the long-term direction for the National Trust, considering how we best deliver our core purpose and remain financially sustainable. This work, to be completed in autumn 2013, will inform all of our planning priorities for 2014 and beyond.
Meanwhile, priorities in our organisational plan for 2013/14 are to:
Other objectives include to:
We will report on our progress in our Annual Report 2013/14.
To view our Accounts and Year on record you can either download the full report or you can download individual sections.
For example, if you are interested in Governance of the National Trust and Net Gain, select these sections and then click on Download selected sections.