This is outside Bridge, but as I was sent it I thought there’d be no harm in posting:

Holy Trinity Church
[nearest open and used Church to the Ipswich Waterfront]

presents

An opportunity to look at the history of the local area in the Victorian Days

with

Frank Grace
(Historian and Author of “Rags & Bones”)

Saturday 11th Sept @ 7pm
Holy Trinity Church
(Bishops Hill/Back Hamlet IP3 8AJ)

Limited Tickets £5 including Cheese & Wine
Ticket and more Info from Jay on 0773 199 1669 or Val on 414325
Or email administrator@waterfrontchurches.org

More details of local events

http://www.waterfrontaction.co.uk/Ipswich_Waterfront_Events_2010.html

Unlike last year’s heritage day this year’s open day is not very well publicised. As I’ve been getting some searches on this I thought I’d put in some details for this year.

The Ipswich heritage day in 2010 will be, as usual, two days, Saturday 11th Septembter and Sunday 12th September. English heritage list the following attractions:

* Admiral’s House
* Arlingtons Brasserie (the original Ipswich museum, hence why Museum Street has no museum on it)
* Bethesda Baptist Chapel
* Broomhill Pool
* Christ Church, Tacket Street
* Freston Tower
* Holy Trinity Church, Bishops Hill / Back Hamlet
* Ipswich School – Exclusive school and Socialist blogger hangout
* Ipswich Unitarian Meeting House
* Pykenham’s Gatehouse
* Ipswich Institute Reading Room and Library
* Sproughton Tithe Barn (totally refurbished apparently)
* St Lawrence’s Church
* St Peter’s Church
* The Old Custom House
* Town Hall
* Waterfront Building, University Campus Suffolk
* Willis Building (surprisingly good if you haven’t seen it)

The opening times vary so please go to the English heritage website.

I had an absolutely fantastic heritage day yesterday.  Some of these will be open today.

First to Christchurch in Tackett Street, which is an incredible version of early Victorian Gothic mixed with iron pillars that could fit in a railway station.  Because it is next to Saint Pancras I pass this church every Sunday, but I’ve been inside about three times.  The congregation (or congregations as they have at least two, both baptist and congretationalist) ran an interesting tour of the church.

Then it was St. Peter’s, which had some people from the Ipswich Hospital band manning the exhibits, and playing live music.  They’ve got the fantastic local history display, which I’ve been told is only partly as a result of the efforts of the Over Stoke history group – not as I’d previously reported all of the exhibition.

Then there was St Mary Stoke, near home.  The Over Stoke history group had a brilliant display, as well as an exhibition from one of the church members about the architect, William Butterfield.

Then to the Custom House, where the Ipswich Maritime Trust had a really interesting exhibition about sailing ships (they have a window exhibition opening today as well) and rope making.

One thing that I thought of was that these were all manned by volunteer groups.  The government seems to have a desire to belittle these groups (for example the desire to charge all adult volunteers £64 if they may ever work with children).  The little battallions are not just more efficient but they actually do what is wanted and not what is dictated by the latest bureaucratic fad.