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ASTON HALL, ONE OF BIRMINGHAM’S MOST ICONIC BUILDINGS, REOPENED THIS WEEK. MARIANNE PETERSON CHATS TO KIMBERLEY BIDDLE, MUSEUM TEAMS MANAGER, TO FIND OUT WHAT MAKES IT SO SPECIA
ASTON Hall, one of Birmingham’s most iconic buildings reopened this week. Marianne Peterson chats to Kimberley Biddle, Museum Manager at Aston Hall, to find out what makes it so special.
It’s hard to believe but in the shadows of the concrete jungle of Spaghetti Junction and Villa Park sits one of Birmingham’s most iconic buildings.
Just a few miles from Birmingham city centre and a stone’s throw from the A38 Expressway is the magnificent Aston Hall – a Grade I listed 17th century mansion. And its location is just one of the things that makes it so special, according to Kimberley Biddle, museum team manager at Aston Hall.
“It’s location definitely makes Aston Hall so unexpected and unique. Situated next to a sevenlane motorway, a premier league football stadium, rows of terrace houses and an industrial estate is a very theatrical and fairy tale like mansion that has survived 400 years of history.”
We Brits are fascinated with stately homes and country mansions. Countless novels and hugely successful TV dramas – from Jane Austen to Downton Abbey – centre on historic houses and the lives of the people who live there. According to research, in 2019 26.9 million visits were made to a National Trust property and 26.8 million people visited one of the UK’s Historic Houses.
In 1864 Aston Hall was the first historic building in Britain to be preserved by a local authority specifically as a public visitor attraction – predating the creation of the National Trust by some 30 years.
After being closed for over a year,
Aston Hall, is now welcoming visitors once again with new displays that explore the fascinating lives of the its residents and its colourful historical past. Like every other UK visitor attraction, the prolonged pandemic-enforced closure has had a significant impact on Aston Hall, but it has also brought some time to reflect on the visitor experience.
Explains Kimberley: “The new displays capture the eventful history of the hall and the fascinating lives of people associated with it. Visitors love the architectural and historical delights of Aston Hall – such as the breath-taking Long Gallery
and the battle scars of the Civil Wars – but they also revel in the real-life stories of the families that lived here.
‘‘We’ve made more of the ancestral history of the Holte family who built Aston Hall in the 1600s and peppered that history with enthralling stories of family rifts, royal visits, pitched battles and even the tragic tale of a tightrope walker.”
Visitors can explore over 30 rooms at Aston Hall, including the Long Gallery – said to be one of Britain’s finest – and the elaborate Great Stairs. But equally fascinating are the servants’ rooms, such as the eery Dick’s Garret at the very top of the house and the purposeful Butler’s Pantry on the ground floor.
There’s also an amazing collection of paintings spanning four centuries to see, such as Peter Lely’s famous, official ‘warts and all’ portrait of Oliver Cromwell and works by the likes of Thomas Gainsborough and George Romney.
“Oliver Cromwell purportedly said to another artist, Samuel Cooper, who was painting his portrait, ‘Remark all these roughnesses, pimples, warts and everything as you see me, otherwise I will never pay a farthing for it.’
‘‘Lely is thought to have based his portrait on Cooper’s and it does
indeed show Cromwell, ‘warts and all’ and so the saying was born.” says Kimberley.
Another historic gem has gone back on display for the first time in over a decade – the hangings from the 17th century bed in the King
Charles Room.
“This is one of the rooms used by King Charles I when he spent the night at Aston in October 1642 shortly before the battle of Edgehill,” says Kimberley. “The bed hangings were in desperate need of restoration and were taken off display over a decade ago. We don’t know the full provenance of them, but they are believed to be hundreds of years old and so to finally have them back on display, reinstated for many more years to
come, is really quite an exciting moment for us all.”
The exquisite embroideries have been painstakingly restored by a team of conservators and volunteers at Birmingham Museums.
So, what else can visitors to Aston Hall expect?
“We’ve also changed the hall’s food and drink offer,” says Kimberley. “With Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery currently closed due to the essential electrical upgrade of the Council House complex, we have welcomed the sous chef from the gallery’s award-winning Edwardian Tearooms to head up a new menu in the Stable Yard Café. We’ll be serving hearty hot lunches for the first time as well as a signature, Astonishing Afternoon Tea inspired by the hall’s Lady Holte’s Gardens.”
Aston Hall is open Wednesday – Sunday. To book visit www. birminghammuseums.org.uk/aston