The Two Hardwick Halls

Thursday was another relatively early start, as Megan had remembered late Wednesday night that we needed to meet Steve W. a half hour before class the next morning.  Everyone was unusually tired this morning, but we managed to find the meeting place in time and Steve took us to meet Ann Priest, the Pro-Vice Chancellor of NTU.  She was lovely and welcoming and said she expects great things from us.  No pressure.

The ruins of the old Hardwick Hall

After that, a bus took Steve (our professor) and the rest of us to Hardwick Hall, a National Trust landmark where the Old Hall is operated/managed by one group, English Heritage, and the New Hall is operated/managed by the National Trust.  Both were built by Bess of Hardwick, close friend and favorite of Queen Elizabeth I and not someone to skimp on the details.  The Old Hall, or what's left of it, can be experienced with an audio tour, which we did.  The audio tour was a bit slow at times, but it was also nice having someone tell me which direction to turn to walk through the remnants of a specific room.  Although it's in ruins, the Old Hall is safe enough to climb all the way to the top floor and look out over the impressive view.  Bess was also extremely fond of fancy plaster overmantels, many of which have survived.  As with Rufford Abbey yesterday, I loved these ruins.

The most elaborate of the overmantels

Several of us were reluctant to leave the view at the top of the house, but tore ourselves away when lunch called.  After our meal, we went to the New Hall, the still intact home that Bess built a mere three years after the old one.  Once again, she built to impress, with fewer plaster overmantels this time.  The stag, a symbol of the Cavendish family (adopted from her third husband) appears everywhere.  Staff even had little stuffed deer sitting around for children to find.  Among the bedrooms and drawing rooms of the upper floors, a few rooms stood out.  When I stepped into the high entertaining room, the sweet smell of the rush mats on the floor hit me immediately, adding to the atmosphere.  In the long gallery, I saw old books that I itched to examine.  And in the private withdrawing room, I asked one of the volunteers about the figures above the fireplace.  He said they were the Muses.

"But I thought there were nine Muses.  I counted ten," I said.

He blinked.  I hastily assured him I must have counted wrong, but when he also did a quick head count, the number was ten.  Picking up his reference binder and leafing through it, he half-joked that he would have to call someone about this misidentification if his official information was wrong.  Sure enough, the piece was listed as showing the nine Muses...and Apollo in their midst.  The volunteer looked rather relieved.

Books in the long gallery of the New Hall

When I finished walking through the house, the others wanted to explore the gardens, but I went to our meet-up point early to avoid aggravating my allergies.  Later, when we all rendezvoused outside, Steve had asked the National Trust manager of the park (I can't remember her specific title) to talk with us about what types of demographics we thought the Old and New Halls tried to cater to, what could be improved, and what we thought of the "visitor care" in each.  Getting to listen to all these museum managers has made me far more aware of just how many decisions are involved in the creation/maintenance/administration of museums.

The New Hall was closer to what I had expected of a stately home on display, with furniture set up the way it would have been back then.  But the Old Hall was beautiful in a mysterious, eerie way.  So I am hard pressed to pick a favorite of the two.

The New Hall

A few of us also went to Asda this afternoon, so I finally have enough groceries to feel settled in.  Hard to believe it's almost the end of the first week; it feels both longer and shorter than that since we arrived!