Old And New Community Projects Uplift Community Spirits
We all know that progress is unstoppable but it’s not all bad. Community projects that go forward without erasing the past are managing to preserve our heritage and culture in the face of advancement. After all, ’we’re only here because of the way we came’. It’s no good knocking out the bottom rungs of the ladder just because we’ve climbed to the top. The route taken to arrive wherever we are now is worthy of note.
Community projects, mindful that landmark buildings restored to their former glory open a window to the past, are serving to uplift whole communities. Connecting to our forefathers via
the historic structures in our villages, towns and cities are both a nurturing and bonding experience.
The ‘Built Historical Environment’ a Priority For Community Projects
The way we help the next generation not to foolishly erase the past in their haste to erect modern, glassy structures is to work ceaselessly to care for our magnificent heritage sites.
When the past has meaning, communities become aware of the bigger picture, of thinking beyond themselves. Our propensity to recall the past and visualize the future is a uniquely human trait. Earth’s lower creatures are largely unaware of the past or the future. Community cohesion is created every time historic landmark buildings are paid the attention they deserve. Who would have thought that community projects involving historic preservation and conservation of the icons of bygone days contribute to human mental and emotional well-being? As is the case with every village and town blessed to have magnificent old buildings in easy view, people are benefitted without even needing to physically visit the structure. A sense of grandeur is uplifting to the human spirit and historic sites seem to be a way to ‘stop time’ and remember all that went before.
Community projects have become aware of tests demonstrating response in the areas associated with positive emotions as well as a deep resonating that occurs in the visceral nervous system when honouring the past. There are even studies showing that visiting a heritage site is more restorative to the human spirit than a sport or the arts – there’s a thing!
There exists a strong desire to pass on these ‘feel-good’ emotions to our loved ones and children. We’re not talking about mandatory excursions to museums, we’re talking about the physical evidence of the past. Historic structures reference prior triumphs over adversity.
Community projects that respect the ‘built historical environment’ epitomise the culture, traditions and values that hold communities together, approach their work with passion and expertise.
MarbleAir’s Midas Touch For Caversham Park and the Reading Community
Caversham Park is one of the most jaw-dropping properties in the UK. Nestled in Reading, Berkshire this 93-acre piece of the past is highly valued. Steeped in mesmerising history, it was bought by BBC Broadcast in 1940. (Its wiretapping services were based here during the Second World War.) Today, Reading is the largest commercial and economic epicentre south-east of London. This singularly stellar community project was honoured to receive the Highly Commended Certificate in the Premier Trophy Awards upon completion. The Caversham Park grounds surrounding the stately Grade II listed Manor house provided development with a number of opportunities.
St. Peter’s parish church renewed by a MarbleAir Community Project
The heart of the Stoke Lyne Village community is St. Peter’s church. Built sometime in the 12th century, it has seen many a vicar. The infamous Rev William Bryant being the only one to have shot himself in the vicarage in 1914 – the year of the first World War. MarbleAir was pleased to keep the building intact as a visual reminder of times past. To look at even just a small church and know it existed long before us and will exist long after us is a humbling but healthy experience that community projects understand as value towards the longevity we humans idealise in a highly ‘disposable’ world. Generations come and generations go, and we can’t meet the people who lived centuries before us. We can, however, connect to our culture and heritage by means of the magnificent buildings that outlived previous generations. In this way community projects working to preserve history go hand in glove with sustainable growth for villages, towns and cities.
Explore the work of Marble Air anytime at http://marbleair.com/
