Learning through local surroundings

Year 7 pupils from King Henry VIII School, Abergavenny, visited Plas Gunter Mansion last week as part of a Successful Futures project study day that reflects changes to the secondary school curriculum in Wales.

From 2021, secondary schools in Wales will have brought together all the Humanities subjects – History, Geography, Religious Education, Sociology and Psychology – and Welsh Government is granting schools the freedom and flexibility to design their own Humanities curriculum.

A new element to this curriculum is the idea of cynefin. Literally translating as ‘habitat’, in essence it means making what pupils learn in schools relevant to their surroundings.

Gwilym Morgan, King Henry’s Geography lead teacher, who accompanied the pupils said, “This new idea is that if they understand where they come from they get a grounding for themselves and can look out and understand the world from their perspective.”

And this is where Plas Gunter Mansion comes into the picture. A secret chapel was discovered in the attic of the house where Catholics could worship in the 1700s when it was illegal and dangerous to do so. It provides important local source material relating to history, religious studies and geography and provides an opportunity for pupils to work alongside one of Abergavenny’s most fascinating community heritage projects.

Two priests who led services in the chapel were denounced by a local Protestant landowner and priest-hunter. Father – now Saint – David Lewis was hanged at Usk in 1679 and was Wales’ last Catholic martyr. The chapel remained hidden for over two centuries until it was rediscovered in the early 1900s.

Stephanie Morgan, one of the visiting pupils said, “The bit about the secret Catholic chapel in the attic was interesting, how Catholic worship was banned and how people got together to create their own little place of worship to suit their needs, that really stood out for me.”

The day out also included visits to St Mary’s Priory, Our Lady and St Michael’s Catholic church and Abergavenny Museum. At the museum, pupils would have seen the Adoration of the Magi altarpiece, which was rescued from the secret chapel in Plas Gunter Mansion and transported to the museum in a wheelbarrow in the 1970s.

Four of the Plas Gunter Mansion volunteers divided pupils into groups and showed them the pictures and information boards on display in the pop-up exhibition space on the ground floor. They told them the history of the house, the story of the Gunter family who built and lived in it for over 100 years and the proposed restoration of the house, which stands on Cross Street.

Liz Terry, Odette Hutchinson, Anna Petts and Christina Maciejewski were impressed by the Year 7 pupils’ enthusiasm for the restoration project. A few had said they wanted to organise a sponsored event at the school to raise money for the project.

“One offered a donation of the £3 that he had on him,” said Anna Petts. “I told him that that was extremely generous but that when he was older, with a successful career, he could donate money then!”

One pupils said they were related to this Gunter family and another said they’d heard that there was a ghost in the Pot and Pineapple part of the mansion, a later extension to the property, and an old fashioned sweet shop until 2016. Amanda Peters who ran the shop named it after a famous confectionery shop set up by Gunter descendants in London in the 1800s.

“Another thought that the whole house should be knocked down,” said Christina Maciejewski, “and rebuilt from scratch!”

The Welsh Georgian Trust, which saved the mansion for Abergavenny in 2017, following a successful appeal, will be bidding for Heritage Lottery funding to restore and enhance the building, turning it into an educational and community resource that celebrates its local roots. The first floor, featuring the main chamber with its decorative plaster ceiling, would become accommodation similar to that offered by Landmark Trust properties.

One of the pupils told the volunteers, “It would be really cool to be able to stay here.” Another suggested a pool and a car park at the back for any B&B guests.

Although the volunteers encouraged the pupils to think about how the area behind the house, formerly the gardens, could potentially be developed this land does not belong to the trust. The intention is to try to acquire that land and restore it to an appropriate garden space that would form part of the visitor experience.

“It would have been nice to go upstairs but obviously the floor and ceiling are in a state, they need renovating badly, but when that’s done there’ll be a lot more to learn up there,” added Year 7 pupil, Stephanie Morgan. “It was interesting to hear about the garden and what that used to be like and it would be really nice to see that again when the renovations start.”

The following day, members of the Plas Gunter Mansion project committee were invited to the school to give thematic talks to the Year 7 pupils.

Gill Wakley talked about the history and heritage of the building, Owen Davies’ presentation was about regeneration and the role of Plas Gunter Mansion in reviving the town centre, and Tony Konieczny covered the significance of the project with regard to the community and tourism.

There is an exhibition of the history of the house in the shop on the ground floor at 39a Cross Street, Abergavenny. This is open to the public on Tuesdays, Fridays and Saturdays from 10.30am till 4pm.

The other half of this pop-up exhibition space is available to community groups for month-long displays. Until the end of July, visitors will be able to see an exhibition celebrating two years of the Plas Gunter Mansion project pop-up space.

In August, the Black Mountains Jazz group will be displaying photographs and information about their Wall2Wall Jazz Festival at the end of that month. Photographs with captions of Old Abergavenny will be on display during September.

Other community groups interested in using the display space should email: info@plasguntermansion.org.uk