Fountains Abbey- Culzean’s Unlikely Twin

Last week I visited Fountains Abbey with Paul Pomfret from Culzean to help inform the re-interpretation project.  Fountains Abbey is one of NTS’s most visited sites and like Culzean has diverse site elements. Paul had heard that they had based their visitor centre on Culzean’s so we were interested to see how a visitor attraction with a similar building, but without the historic building restrictions of Culzean functions. We met with Customer Development Manager, Kath Knight and Education Manager Tessa Goldsmith.

NT Fountains Abbey, near Ripon
The similarities with the visitor centre were immediately apparent, and talk of Swan Ponds made us feel at home. But the paralells just kept on coming.  A 12th century Abbey  might not seem the most likely doppelganger for Culzean but they really do seem spookily alike.

a modern-day copy of Culzean

Fountains’s visitor centre was a new build back in 1992 by Edward Cullinan Architects. http://www.ecarch.co.uk/projects/fab.html. It echoes Culzean’s Home Farm quadrangle almost exactly in terms of layout and use, although clearly far more modern in appearance. Purpose built at the time to reflect the needs of the visitor attraction, staff are now reviewing the visitor journey and it is clear that the centre doesn’t function as originally intended.Over time, the interpretive areas here have been reclaimed by other functions like retail, as at Culzean. Similarly there are staff offices here which may become visitor facing areas, there is also a lecture theatre/AV area that is rarely used. Kath explained that there are various plans to build another new building where visitors can recieve an interpretive experience and introduction to the site, as part of wider plans to completely review the whole visitor journey.

It did seem that we shared a lot of the same problems but of course there were some areas where Culzean could perhaps learn from Fountains. For instance the property relies heavily on volunteers, to deliver learning events, and retail work as well as guided tours and conservation work. However they have  a volunteer manager post who co-ordinates this, as opposed to it being part of someone’s role.  And while they are trying to  get Abbey visitors out and about around the estate and other buildings and appreciate its more than just an Abbey, we have the inverse problem that we want more of them to go in the castle. Unlike Culzean, arriving at the car park and visitor centre area seemed very clear and straightforward, but it turns out, they too have issues with multiple car parks and entrances and are also looking to rationalise this.

The most interesting part of our visit was learning how our NT equivalents had approached the challenge of creating a new interpretive space for the abbey. Porter’s Lodge sits very close to the Abbey.  It is a new build, but is cleverly concealed within the walls of a ruined building. Apparently getting a new adventure playground put in by the visitor centre (another massively successful project) was far more problematic.  While they expected issues around disturbing historic landscape, it was quite straightforward. The new build was able to sit on top of an existing concrete slab, and was built within the walls so it doesn’t disturb the existing structure and is wonderfully subtle. If anything, its perhaps a little too concealed.

the entrance to porters lodge

The architecture of the build maximises on natural light as well as on views of the structures and landscape outside- basically by using a lot of glass. Images on the walls are transparent and interpret what you are looking at through the glass. Although I was not blown away by some of the design which I felt looked a bit outdated, and it relies mostly on you reading a fair bit of text, for the most part, the centre succeeds in interpreting beliefs at the time and life in the Abbey. It certainly puts people back into the story while maintaining a peaceful and contemplative atmosphere, perhaps helped by the sounds of gregorian chant in the background.

transparent graphics on the glass
scale model of the abbey
wall about early beliefs

Tessa explained that she is now adding some hands-on activities including monks robes you can try on, and a children’s guide to engage kids in the display more.  There is a large model at the display’s centre which shows how the abbey looked and its nice to be able to see this along with views to the ruin. She’s also consulting with specialist local groups on sensory impairment additions. Kath and Tessa have kindly provided copies of their brief and interpretive plan for our files.

Elsewhere on the site we also visited the mill, and walked round some of the grounds using the estate map.   We were unable to try out the audio guide, although this sounded like it would have been worthwhile- it puts you in the shows of  a monk getting an induction.  Neither did we get to see Fountains Hall – the big house on the estate. Like Culzean, there is also  too much to do in one day.

Some other highlights from the visit were a delightful stop-frame animation describing a day in the life of a monk. This was a little bit irreverent (apparently some NT members thought so) and funny and hits just the right tone for kids. We asked who had produced it and it turned out it was done by students at a local media college- so there’s hope for us yet!  Also they’ve had a lot of success with drop-in self-help activities for families. Materials are just left in the space with instructions for something to make (slightly more complicated for each age group), and parents or carers help their kids to make the item.

All in all it was just quite inspiring to be able to think about our project away from the desk. For instance, a table you could sit at and handle some albeit rather unconvincing fake food reminded me that we have a lot of freedom with the Culzean kitchen. Fountains are facing a lot of the same challenges as us, and while they may not have the answers it was good to make contact with them, and we’ll be interested to watch how their visitor journey project progresses.


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