Don’t leave Clandon as a meaningless ruin
Clandon should NOT be left a ruin
By Andy Smith FRHistS
Clandon Park was for many years a jewel in the National Trust's crown. I was closely connected with Clandon in the 1990s and early 2000s, firstly as an ordinary NT volunteer then as editor of the NT West Surrey Centre's newsletter and then for 3 years as Chairman of the West Surrey Centre. That was in the days when the 'centres and associations' movement was still very much at the heart of NT life and provided not just a steady supply of volunteers for the Trust but raised a huge amount of money to sustain many NT conservation projects. In the West Surrey Centre during my time we generated several hundred thousand pounds from our fundraising, and made very sizeable donations to the Trust's Mount Snowdon Appeal, Enterprise Neptune (later rebranded the Neptune Coastal Campaign) and supporting vital work on the coastal paths of North Cornwall, as well as reflecting local concerns such as improving visitor facilities in the Surrey Hills. In terms both of our events programme and our fundraising we were among the three most active and successful NT Centres.
Clandon was our adopted home. We held most of our West Surrey Centre meetings and other events and fundraising activities there, including our busy programme of lectures, our concerts, and our summer and Christmas fairs. Although we were all volunteers, Clandon Park was a regular workplace for many of us in the West Surrey Centre and one in which we all felt privileged to walk the corridors.
What made Clandon special was, however, not its structure but its interiors, which were quite spectacular. That is why the idea that it should be left in ruins after being wrecked by fire is, frankly, beyond comprehension. Eight years ago after that fire, my anger over the way the National Trust are treating the former family seat of the Earls of Onslow has not subsided. Having been so closely connected with the property more than two decades ago, I can honestly say that if Clandon had somehow ended up being engulfed in flames back in those days (and I doubt it would suffered such a fate, as I am certain that far better precautions were in place at that time), and if the NT leadership had then gone on to insist on leaving this wonderful place in a state of ruination, rather than restoring it, there would have been absolute uproar. Indeed, I cannot imagine that anyone would have dreamt of making such a suggestion at that point.
Everyone, at the NT head office, at the Southern Region office a few miles away at Polesden Lacey, those based at the property itself, including the curator and staff, as well as all the volunteers who kept the place going, and the local community in surrounding villages, would all have regarded such a decision by NT HQ as an appalling dereliction of duty - a betrayal of the principles of the National Trust. I do not believe it would for one moment have even been considered.
I think that architectural historian Simon Thurley (who was for 7 years curator of Historic Royal Palaces and for 13 years the chief executive of English Heritage) expressed the case against the NT's cultural vandalism very well when he said: "Houses are not classrooms, they are places where people live and have lived. All the most successful fire restorations, whatever the approach—from Uppark to Astley Castle—have given back to the ruins life and meaning. Clandon was burnt by tragic accident, there is no meaning in the ruined walls—the job in hand is to make it mean something to people of the future."
Many good people have spent the last few years in increasingly heated argument with NT Trustees and senior management but, thus far, to no avail. The "new broom sweeps clean" attitude of the present 'modernising' leadership of the NT seems utter impervious to argument, even when it is clear that the vast majority of those connected with Clandon Park, at every level, let alone ordinary grass-roots NT members familiar with Clandon from past visits, would wish to see the exquisite interiors properly reconstructed and restored. The fact that the funds are readily available for this purpose, including a substantial insurance payment, makes the NT leaders' disregard of the case for restoring Clandon Park even more mystifying. Thankfully, Restore Trust are keeping the flag flying for a restoration - and all power to them!
* Andy Smith is a longstanding National Trust member and a former Chairman of the NT West Surrey Centre. He was for 12 years the Director of the Surrey Campaign to Protect Rural England and for 8 years the Secretary of Surrey Historic Buildings Trust. He is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.