All Saints Church Kingston

The Place where England Began

The Case for Support

Registered charity 1080671 www.askingston.co.uk

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Contents

Background Page 5

The need for change Page 8

The project—overview Page 10

The project—detail Page 12

The project—budget Page 17

The project—timescale Page 18

Executive summary Page 3

Capital fund-raising strategy—a summary Page 19

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Executive summary

The Grade 1 listed church of All Saints in Kingston upon Thames has a rich history, and has served the community down the ages. It is the site of the original Royal Estate around which the town grew up. However, its facilities and outward appearance now present a huge lost opportunity for the nation and for the Town, as this Case for Support explains. The first person to be rightfully called "King of All England" was crowned here in the 10th century and the town’s - and the nation's - life since then is recorded in the monuments, plaques and artwork in the church. For many centuries the church was the largest public meeting space in the area and, though poorly resourced, that heritage of community service and engagement continues today. Our development will create a heritage project in the church - supported with a grant of £899,000 from the Heritage Lottery Fund - to tell Kingston’s Royal Saxon story and to explain the development of the town, and the nation, since the birth of England here over a thousand years ago. We will also bring essential improvements to the church’s facilities (toilets, light, heat, simple refreshment) so that it can better serve as a place of community exchange, service, culture, reflection and worship. On the north lawn we will erect a community building to deliver services for young people, those with disabilities, visitors, community groups and those with medical needs by working with a diverse range of partners including the Royal Borough of Kingston, Kingston College, the Primary Care Trust, the Business Improvement District and local voluntary organisations. The new building will house a social enterprise café and will be a venue for employment, education and volunteering. The remainder of our grounds will be re-landscaped to enhance this largest piece of green space in the centre of the Town as an oasis of respite, peace and refreshment. We have been granted all necessary planning permissions and Church faculties and have a design team in place, with the object of starting construction work in August 2012. Phase 1 (in the church) will be complete by December 2013, and the whole project by December 2014. The total project cost is £8.6 million with £3.2 million for work to the church, £4 million for the new building, £900,000 for landscaping and Heritage Lottery Funded activities of £450,000.

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Background

The place where England began

There has been a church on the site of All Saints since at least the ninth century. During the tenth century the site was the location for the crowning of the first King (Athelstan, in 925 AD) who could truly be called the King of England. It is no exaggeration to say that this is the place where England began. The Coronation Stone—a tangible link to the birth of Saxon England

A thousand years of history

Parts of the present church date from the thirteenth century, but the building has been altered and added to over the years. It is now a Grade 1 listed building (the only one in Kingston) and through its architecture, its memorials and its monuments it charts a fascinating history of the town, and the nation, for the last thousand years.

Left: A fragment of a Saxon cross, the oldest artefact in the church.

Right: A memorial brass to Robert Skerne, a local merchant, and his wife Joanna,

illegitimate daughter of Edward III

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Clockwise from top left: tomb of Sir Antony Benn (1558—1618), Recorder of Kingston and London; memorial to Henry Davidson (1771—1827), prominent London trader in sugar (and slaves); memorial to George Bate, successively physician to Charles I, Oliver Cromwell and Charles II; memorial plate to the ten children of Rev Edmund Staunton, who all died in infancy; a simple memorial stone to Cesar Picton (d. 1836), who became one of the earliest wealthy black men in the country; statue of Lady Theodosia, wife of Lord Liverpool (Prime Minister from 1812 to 1827, and the third longest serving Prime Minister ever)

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A centre of the community

The church has always been at the centre of the civic life of the town. The start of the Mayoral and Court years are marked by special services here, and the church also hosts the annual service following the public Act of Remembrance on Remembrance Sunday. And when the Queen visited Kingston in 2002 she visited the church to unveil a memorial to the crowning of Edward the Elder eleven hundred years before.

The church also plays a major role in the cultural life of the town. It is one of the largest venues for classical music in South West London, and is chosen by many choirs and orchestras for evening concerts. Free lunchtime recitals—some featuring the internationally acclaimed organ—are held here thirty weeks a year; and the church choir, which sings at Sunday services and at occasional concerts, is recognised as one of the finest parish church choirs in the country.

The church is also home to a wide variety of social events throughout the year, as well as providing a daily service of tea, coffee and biscuits to anyone in need of a sympathetic ear, or just a place of peace.

Left: 250 singers getting to grips with the notes at a “Come and Sing” . Right: dancing at the annual Burns Night celebrations.

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The need for change

For centuries the church has been at the heart of Kingston life, and the building is ideally located to recover this role. But it is sadly in poor repair, unwelcoming to visitors, ill equipped to serve tourists and concert audiences—in short, unable without major investment to fulfil its potential contribution to the life of the town.

Viewed from the town’s main shopping street (left) the church is almost completely hidden by unpruned trees; and the visitor who penetrates the canopy is met (right) by a blank wall - the main entrances to the church are round the other side.

The churchyard is unprepossessing, even though it is the largest green space in Kingston, at its very centre. The furniture (right) is broken and ill placed. The grass (left) is patchy and, in some places, the ground is bare. Planting of trees is chaotic and gives rise to dark spaces and hidden areas (centre) that allow unwanted and dangerous behaviour. There is no lighting.

The entrances to the church are unwelcoming, and access for wheelchair users is at best difficult.

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Visitors are served refreshments from trestle tables with an urn (left), in stark contrast to the memorials on the walls. These tables also serve as an interval bar when the church is used for concerts. Water has to be fetched from the choir vestry on the other side of the church, where the dishwasher is also located. The fridge is in the clergy vestry, also on the other side of the church. The church’s only toilet (right) is inaccessible to wheelchairs, down some steps in the choir vestry.

Light fittings (left) are obtrusive, difficult to maintain, uneconomic and poorly located. The wiring system is old and overloaded, and lighting of all areas is poor. The church is heated by ugly and inefficient convectors (above right), while the walls show extensive staining (below right) from water ingress.

The choir vestry is in poor repair, especially since it was flooded in 2010. The windows are broken and the decor is shabby. And although extensively used by the choir at weekends, and as a green room for visiting performers, the vestry is much underused during weekdays.

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The project — an overview

The project aims to address these problems in three ways. First, we will renovate and reorder the interior of the church itself and move the Coronation Stone, a Grade One listed monument, from its current site outside the Guildhall to a place in the churchyard near the site of the original Saxon coronations. Since the Victorian Age the Stone has been the focus for the town’s celebration of its Saxon history, and the move will make it more accessible to visitors and prominent feature of the town centre. In this way we can help to bring the church’s heritage to life. We will be able to recount the Royal Saxon past clearly and relevantly; explain how England’s government first developed here in Kingston; bring together Kingston’s royal history in one site; tell the stories of Kingston people through the memorials in the Church; and show how these stories speak of social and political development both in this area and in England as a whole. We will also bring essential improvements to the church’s facilities (toilets, light, heat, simple refreshment) so that it can better serve as a place of community exchange, service, culture, reflection and worship. Second, we will construct a new building over three floors (including basement) in the churchyard. This building will house a community café and will provide space for the creation of a range of projects and social enterprises that will bring together the community in a celebration of our national and local heritage and what we as Kingstonians can do to help each other through social action. Third, we will transform the churchyard, restoring it for use by visitors to the town and making it a place of grace, beauty and peace. Taken together, these changes will create a heritage and community complex which adds special cultural value to a vibrant retail town and which provides valuable services for the whole community.

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The project — the church

With the generous support of the Heritage Lottery Fund and the assistance of our architect Ptolemy Dean — who has a fine record in the sensitive restoration of old buildings — we have developed a plan which will create a place which reflects the national and local historic importance of the site. We aim to realise the church’s potential as a visitor attraction, and display all aspects of the heritage that All Saints embodies, while enhancing its role as a place of worship for the past millennium and for the future. In order to achieve these objectives we will: ◊ open up a new main north door facing the busy retail heart of Kingston ◊ improve access to all parts of the building, especially for those with

disabilities ◊ develop the choir vestry so that it will also serve as an information room

for visitors ◊ clean and refurbish the internationally renowned organ ◊ install modern catering facilities ◊ install an efficient, flexible and economical system of lighting and heating ◊ provide toilet facilities for visitors, concert-goers and congregation ◊ improve the overall appearance of All Saints ◊ reconfigure the central nave of the church to better reflect its role for

worship ◊ create a space at the East End for meetings and community events

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This floor plan shows how the proposed North door creates a new axis of movement within the church. The space to the west of this axis is shown laid out for worship, with the altar forming a focal point, but all the furniture will be easily movable and the space will readily adapt for concert use or for exhibitions, dance or social events. The space to the ease, delineated by a foldable decorative metal screen, will be available for a wide range of community functions, and will continue to serve as a refreshment area during the week.

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The project — the new building

The new building will be built on the western end of the North lawn of the churchyard. By using the rather dark space behind the Thames Street shops we have been able to minimise the impact on the valuable green space that the churchyard provides. The building will be two stories tall, with a basement. We will reopen the north-west door of the church to provide a link with the new building (and also to give access to the information room in the refurbished choir vestry). A colonnade along the east side of the building will link the north-west door to Clarence Street, and will also provide access to the Coronation Stone in its new position outside the new building. The new building has been designed using modern materials, but in a style which is sympathetic to the church it will complement. It will be constructed to the highest environmental standards possible. The new building is intended to provide a range of social and community resources to embellish our ministry of hospitality and welcome. It will be open to all, of all faiths and none. The building will provide: ◊ a dedicated space for young people (working with the Royal Borough's

Youth Service)

◊ a social enterprise café giving employment to people with disabilities (working with Kingston College)

◊ a new home for Tourist Information (working with the Business Improvement District)

◊ space for a low cost counselling service that the church is developing

◊ both large and small spaces for health promotion (working with the Primary Care Trust and other local health providers)

◊ facilities for further heritage education (working with the Royal Borough's Heritage Service)

◊ a training suite for businesses in the Town

◊ space for local community groups to meet

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A permanent yet changing exhibition in the cafe and resource area will include visual displays and information boards. Local groups such as schools will be encouraged to contribute to these and they will help explain the history of ASK and the town. The resource centre will become an information hub, creating links to other local attractions in the busy streets around the new site. There will be well-equipped educational and skills development facilities; especially in relation to information technology. The new community building will help us to challenge common misconceptions of what a Church can be. It will bring together organisations and individuals with common aims and it will bring together previously overlooked assets. It will offer a platform for a wide range of local community organisations, whilst inviting members of the general public to share in the rich history and future potential of All Saints Kingston.

Elevations of the new building from the east (left) and north (right) showing its sympathetic scale in relation to the church and surrounding buildings. The arches forming part of the colonnade echo—without slavishly copying—similar shapes in the church architecture.

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Plans of the new extension showing (centre) the ground floor colonnade and new display area for the Coronation Stone.

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The project—the churchyard

A plan of the proposed landscaping of the churchyard is below. The landscaping scheme will also allow for the original wall structure of St Mary’s Chapel to be marked out. This building, on the Market Place (south) side of the church, was one of the first in Kingston and its marking out will add to the historical character of the town centre space.

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The project — budget

A more detailed breakdown of this budget is below. In a stable operational year ASK is expected to receive in excess of 70,000 visitors per annum and projected to receive £140,000 in income. ASK is expected to be self-sufficient in revenue terms from its first year of operation.

Summary

Works to church £3,236,000

New building £4,074,000

Landscaping and boundaries £916,000

Heritage activities £451,000

Total £8,677,000

Costs to date included in project cost

Works to church: design and

procurement phase

Works to church: delivery phase

New building and landscaping:

design and procurement

phase

New building: delivery phase

Landscaping: delivery phase

Construction and fitting out costs

0 0 £2,325,000 0 £3,025,000 £825,000

Archaeological and survey costs

£14,900 £10,000 £25,000 £8,700 £216,400 0

Professional fees £121,800 £201,500 £151,800 £423,600 £175,400 £75,700

Heritage activity costs

0 0 £451,500 0 0 0

Administration, fundraising and legal costs

n/a £97,200 £178,400 £6,000* £49,700 0*

VAT £27,300 £42,300 £40,400 £86,500 £83,200 £15,100

TOTAL £164,100 £351,000 £3,172,100 £524,900 £3,549,100 £915,900

Notes: 1 Totals may not sum due to rounding. 2 * - Administration and fundraising costs included in previous column

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The project—timescale

This project has been developed over a period of four years in close consultation with local interests, including the Royal Borough, the local business community and local interest groups including the Kingston Society. Planning permission (including listed building consent) was granted in late 2010, and the necessary consents have also been obtained from the Southwark diocesan authorities. In June 2011 the Heritage Lottery Fund announced its decision to make a grant of £899,000 towards the project. This has enabled work to be carried forward with a view to starting construction in August 2012, subject to the availability of funds. The provisional programme of work thereafter is as follows:

Construction phase of work on church commences

August 2012

Design work completed on new building and landscaping

August 2012

Tender action for new building and landscaping

January—March 2013

Construction phase of work on new building commences

July 2013

Construction work on church complete December 2013

Archaeological clearance and enabling works on new building site

January—March 2013

Construction phase of landscaping work commences

July 2014

Construction of new building complete; fit-out commences

July 2014

Project complete December 2014

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Key strengths A SWOT analysis has identified the key strengths of the project:

· The involvement of a renowned design and restoration team. · Increased recognition within the wider community of the project's potential to be a driver for change in Kingston.

· Coherence of the project with the local authority regeneration agenda · Increased interest and understanding in the role of the church within the community.

· Social inclusion programmes offered by the development of the project. · The national value and impact of the project.

Communications Strategy The communications strategy envisages the use of a range of new communications tools for the project. These tools will include computer-generated images, a digital walk-through of the building and development of the project’s web-site. These will develop alongside more traditional print communication tools. Key groups for ongoing cultivation in relation to the capital campaign can be summarised as follows:

· Local, regional and national decision makers. · Opinion formers - newspaper columnists, TV and radio presenters etc. · Individuals and organisations in the public and private funding sectors. · Wealthy private individuals.

Future Strategy The implementation of the capital campaign will focus on the methodology of personal and peer-to-peer contact. We will as part of the campaign continue to target individuals who have personal contact or peer group contact with:

· Trustees of trusts and foundations. · Decision makers in key public funding sector organisations. · Decision makers in the private sector. · Local networking capability.

The strategy will focus on the following primary sources:

· Major gift and private donations. · Sponsorship. · Trusts and foundations.

And the following secondary sources:

· Internet fund-raising. · International fund-raising.

Capital fund-raising strategy—a summary

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