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A vivid insight into Tudor living on the grand scale.

Alston Court.

One of the most important late-medieval merchant’s houses in the country comes under the scrutiny of John Goodall – a Country Life article. Photography by Paul Highnam/Country Life. 

During the late Middle Ages, the cloth industry bestowed on Nayland quite exceptional prosperity. In 1522, in fact, it was assessed as the 22nd richest town in the kingdom. As a legacy of this wealth, there is preserved here an outstanding collection of timber-frame houses. Among them is one little known building of national importance.

Alston Court stands in the heart of the village, across a narrow lane from the church (a chapel of ease until Nayland was defined as an independent parish in 1782). It integrates what were previously two distinct properties. The principal of these evolved around three sides of a central courtyard that was closed to the south by a much more modest house. As is often the case with timber-frame buildings, the fabric has been adapted over time. In recent years, through the research of architectural historian Leigh Alston, inspired by a passion for the building and the coincidence of his name, it has been possible to untangle the evolution of the whole complex (although the names of the individual owners responsible remain tantalizingly obscure). The story of the present building begins in the late 13th century when a house was built with a hall fronting onto the south end of the market place. This prominent position within the village underlines the relative importance of the property. So, too, does its location between the parish church and the Court Knoll, a castle site known to have been occupied between the 11th and 13th centuries. It is not impossible, therefore, that the house in some way served as the successor to the castle, perhaps as the residence of a steward for absentee lords.

The only surviving fragment from this first building is the frame of a cross-range that contains service rooms at the low end of the hall. Its unusually massive timbers and archaic framing, which includes lap joints and passing braces, suggest it was constructed in the 13th-century. These compare to those of nearby Abbas Hall, Great Cornard, which incorporates timbers felled in 1289.

It is a mark of architectural ambition, therefore, that the service range – a utilitarian building – has a span of 19ft. 

This may be the oldest substantially intact two-storied timber-framed cross-wings with a projecting or jettied gable in the country. Jetties were first documented in London in the 1240s but only fragments of comparable examples survive elsewhere. The associated 13th-century hall is now lost, but the outline of its low and broad roof gable is visible in the wall of the service range. Such proportions – as well as excavations in 2003 – demonstrate that the hall was internally divided by arcades, like a church nave, and heated by a central hearth set about 3ft below modern ground level. The hall must have had an associated set of withdrawing chambers, but of these nothing remains.

In about 1410, the 13th-century hall was swept away and replaced by the present one. In deference to changing fashions, the new building was taller than its predecessor and designed without aisles. The complexity and scale of its open-timber roof underlined the status of the owner. In this case, the interior is spanned by a tie beam that supports a crown-post with a capital and base.

Two facing side doors in the body of the hall gave access to the interior. These and the buttery and pantry doors from the service range were probably screened off from the main volume of the room with a timber partition, although no trace of it remains (presumably it was moveable). There is no evidence that the main entrance to the hall was covered by a porch. Instead, by local convention, the entrance area was perhaps demarcated by freestanding posts in the street.

At the same time that the new hall was constructed in about 1410, a cross range, probably containing bedrooms and withdrawing apartments, was added behind its dais. To unify the appearance of the building from the street, meanwhile, the counterpart gable of the 13th-century service range at the opposite end of the hall was rebuilt. The internal arrangements of this new domestic range, which partially survives, have been obscured by the next – and most dramatic – round of changes to the building.

In the decades either side of 1520, the hall and the room beyond the dais were refenestrated, together with the rest of the façade. Meanwhile, cut through the bulk of the 15th-century domestic range, was a new two-storey block of unexpected, but intimate, splendour raised up above a basement. This incorporates two superbly preserved interiors, each warmed by a fire and originally connected by a stair; perhaps a parlour at ground level and a great chamber (an entertainment chamber that probably doubled as the principal bedroom) covered by a timber barrel ceiling.

The walls of the new building were laid with panels of brick and the structure is unusually dense with timber, evidence that money was lavished on the work. Curiously, there is clear evidence in the form of superfluous peg holes drilled into the frame that the form of the courtyard windows was adapted during the course of construction. No less demonstrative of its opulence is the carving that encrusts many of the timbers facing into the courtyard.

Some of this carving, such as the roll mouldings and scroll decoration of the windows and ceiling timbers, is typical of the period and the region. It includes the figure of a halberdier in the parlour (a motif found nationally in domestic interiors in about 1500; a contemporary painted example survives at Shandy Hall, North Yorkshire, for example) and two vigorously carved heads, near life-size, in the great chamber.

Other elements are without obvious parallel at all, notably the flamboyant foliage interleaved with animals and figures of the main horizontal elements of the exterior. This resembles the marginal decoration of French printed books produced for the English market in Paris from the late 15th century. Such publications, notably the many editions of Books of Hours produced by Philippe Pigouchet and Simon Vostre, enjoyed widespread popularity in England and it is quite possible that one such volume owned by the patron of the work served as the model for this carving.

Who that owner might have been, however, remains uncertain. An exceptional collection of brilliantly coloured (and correspondingly costly) heraldic glass, now concentrated in the hall and the adjacent parlour, seems to promise an answer. In fact, as Edward Martin in The Proceedings of the Suffolk Institute of Archaeology (2017) has demonstrated, it raises more questions than it answers.

Mr Martin has divided the collection into two stylistically distinct sets of panels (there are also some delightful clear-glass quarries depicting birds). The marriages celebrated by the glass predominantly concern families of secondary social rank with Norfolk connections. They lead, however, into a historical labyrinth, where the documentation is too exiguous for any certainty of association. However, it might, with some confusing twists and turns and a heraldic leap of faith, potentially substantiate an association of the work with the families of two rich Nayland clothiers – John Payne (d.1526) or Thomas Abell (d.1524).

The latter seems particularly attractive, because a shield in the great chamber (associated with the adaptation of the structural frame, but certainly original), bears a monogram surmounted by a crown. This latter detail, however, is appropriate only to royal or celestial figures.

It therefore precludes any reference to a clothier, however rich (and for whom a merchant’s mark would anyway be more appropriate). So the mystery of patronage remains. Mr Alston believes the monogram to be a pun on the symbol for ‘love conquers all’ (as described on the brooch of Chaucer’s Prioress)combined with Abel and anne-the name of Thomas Abell’s widow.

Probably in conjunction with changes to the domestic spaces, other alterations to the building also took place in the early 16th century. The 13th-century service range was lengthened to create a workshop and storage space. From the arrangement of timbers in one part of the extension and patches of smoke blackening, it seems that one section of the range was open internally through the full height of the building, possibly to accommodate a heated dying vat. During this period the small house, now incorporated in the rear of the property, was built.

By the late 16th century, the cloth industry was in decline and so were the fortunes of the house. In the 1530s or 1540s, its prominent position on the market place was partially usurped by a new house erected in front of it – clearly the owner’s authority and standing had diminished. Soon afterwards, the house is first securely identified in the 1606 will of one Andrew Parish. It was then called Grooms, which in turn suggests an earlier association with the family of William Groom (d.1475), another rich clothier. It was still occupied by a Mr Parish in 1674, when it was assessed for six hearths in the Hearth Tax return.

Some surviving fragments of internal decoration can probably be ascribed to the Parish family. A section of a painted cloth, now being conserved, was found behind the wainscoting of the parlour. This wainscoting was installed according to an inscribed date in 1630. Perhaps the cloth, a very rare surviving fragment of cheap domestic decoration, is coeval. There are also fragments of wall painting depicting wainscoting in the great chamber, a common decorative subject in middling houses of the region. 

In 1768, the house came into the possession of the Alston family, who gave the property its familiar modern name. A remarkable series of pastel family portraits (as well as a picture of the housekeeper) by the artist Beeston Coyte (d.1775) survived until recently in the house. They were bequeathed to the Ipswich Museum, but are not on display there – perhaps they should be returned on loan?

The Alstons owned the house for the next two centuries, but many of their cumulative changes to its fabric were swept away in a major restoration begun in 1902 by Dr Edward Liveing Fenn. He inherited the property from his maternal aunt, the last direct descendant of the Alstons, who lived here for 90 years. Before Dr Fenn’s work, the roof of the hall had been ceiled and many of the courtyard windows had been plastered over. The house was, however, known to antiquarians and sufficiently valued for the Tudor wing to have been reinforced with ironwork in about 1880.

Under the direction of architect Charles J. Blomfield, who wrote up his restoration in the Architectural Review (1907), the fabric was stripped back and reconstituted in much its present form. Blomfield arranged the Tudor glass in its present configuration and added a kitchen wing, with rooms for servants, to the east of the house. The interior as he left it and a very different history are recorded in Country Life, July 19, 1924.

Alston Court was sold by the family in 1968 and has since passed through several hands. Its present owner, who acquired the property in 2013, has collected furnishings appropriate to the interior, restored some of its Arts and Crafts features and actively promoted the study of the building. As a result of this care, it is not only possible to enjoy the atmosphere of this exceptional survival, but understand it more fully than ever before.

2023 - Read about the wonderful new gallery being built in Sudbury for Gainsborough's masterpieces; follow the trail of a tireless local environmental campaigner; get ready for the second EA cultural festival, the Bures music festival and Opera at Layer Marney; discover the beautiful garden of Holm House with its wildflower meadow and lake; travel through the Colne valley along the Gainsborough line; find out where you can get local financial advice; enjoy an illustrated walk in the Stour Valley; and read our Chairman's update on proposed housing developments, solar farms, and the National Grid's Bramford to Twinstead electricity grid reinforcement project. 

2022 - Read about the wonderful new gallery being built in Sudbury for Gainsborough's masterpieces; follow the trail of a tireless local environmental campaigner; get ready for the second EA cultural festival, the Bures music festival and Opera at Layer Marney; discover the beautiful garden of Holm House with its wildflower meadow and lake; travel through the Colne valley along the Gainsborough line; find out where you can get local financial advice; enjoy an illustrated walk in the Stour Valley; and read our Chairman's update on proposed housing developments, solar farms, and the National Grid's Bramford to Twinstead electricity grid reinforcement project. 

2022 Magazine
Year: 2022
Chairman’s Letter
Year: 2022
Rebel with a cause
Year: 2022
A National Centre for Thomas Gainsborough’s Masterpieces
Year: 2022
EA Festival at Hedingham Castle
Category: Culture
Year: 2022
The Gainsborough Line
Category: Adventure. Travel, Explore Colne Stour
Year: 2022
Music, Mischief and Mayhem – Opera at Layer Marney
Year: 2022
Bures Music Festival
Year: 2022
Holm House Gardens in Suffolk
Year: 2022

2020 - Welcome to our 2020 lockdown edition - only published ONLINE. Read about the wonderful Alfred Munnings Exhibition "Behind the Lines"; find out how the beavers have been getting on at the Spains Hall Estate in Finchingfield, introduced back into Essex after an absence of 400 years; explore the link between Ferriers in Bures and the Voyage of the Mayflower, the Salem Witch trials and Wampum belts; read a fascinating interview with Carl Shillingford, talented Michelin chef and keen local forager; and enjoy a celebratory update from Ken Forrester on South African wines and his support for a wonderful local school.  

2020 Magazine
Year: 2020
Chairman’s Letter
Year: 2020
Behind the Lines: Alfred Munnings, War Artist
Category: Art, Culture
Year: 2020
The Foragers Retreat – Michelin chef in Pebmarsh.
Category: Food, Nature
Year: 2020
Dam Good Job – Beavers back in Essex after 400 years.
Category: Explore Colne Stour, Nature
Year: 2020
Ferriers – a Bures house and its connection to the Mayflower.
Category: Adventure. Travel, Architectural Interest, Culture, History
Year: 2020
Three special milestones for Ken Forrester Wines  
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2020

2019 - Read about Tudor living on a grand scale at Alston Court, how Samuel Courtauld & Co. shaped our towns and villages, hear inspiring stories of local vineyards Tuffon Hall and West Street, get an update on the Dedham Vale AONB extension, and take a tour round Polstead Mill, one of East Anglia's beautiful secret gardens. 

Chairman’s Letter
Year: 2019
Dedham Vale AONB extension
Year: 2019
The Tuffon Hall Transformation
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2019
A Hong Kong racehorse in an Essex field
Category: Nature
Year: 2019
Andy Gentle – A chainsaw love affair
Category: Business
Year: 2019
A vivid insight into Tudor living on the grand scale.
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2019
Underground Moats & Zinc Cathedrals
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2019
Secret Gardens of East Anglia – Polstead Mill
Category: Gardens
Year: 2019
Repairing the damage of a supermarket delivery van
Year: 2019
How Samuel Courtauld and Co. shaped our towns and villages
Category: Architectural Interest, Culture, History
Year: 2019
Ken Forrester
Year: 2019
CSCA Photography Competition
Year: 2019
Garden Visits
Category: Gardens
Year: 2019
Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2019

2018 - Read about Hedingham Castle, a new National Centre for Gainsborough in Sudbury, award-winning new Gins from Adnams, aspects of our Industrial Heritage, the Theatre Royal in Bury St Edmunds, the Dedham Vale AONB and Stour Valley Project, and take a look at the proposed new Constitution for CSCA.. 

Chairmans Letter April 2018
Category: Annual, News, Planning Issues
Year: 2018
History of the Theatre Royal, Bury St Edmunds
Category: Architectural Interest, Art, Culture, History
Year: 2018
Another Suffolk Success Story – Time for a G & T?
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2018
Some more aspects of our Industrial Heritage
Category: Agricultural, Brewing, distilling and wine, History
Year: 2018
An Earl’s Tower
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2018
A Castle Reborn
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2018
Dedham Vale AONB and Stour Valley Project
Category: Explore Colne Stour, Nature, Planning Issues
Year: 2018
A National Centre for Gainsborough set within the town where he was born and the landscape that inspired him
Category: Architectural Interest, Art, History
Year: 2018
Garden Visits
Category: Gardens, History
Year: 2018
Treasurer’s Report
Category: Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2018
New Constitution
Year: 2018
Editor’s Notes
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2018

2017 - Read about our local industrial heritage, Paycocke's House history, why heritage matters, the art of Alfred Munnings, a haunted house in Lamarsh, celebrating Gainsborough, the beauty of recreating Cedric Morris's Iris collection and a small wine snippet from Ken Forrester. 

Chairmans Letter April 2017
Category: Annual, News, Planning Issues
Year: 2017
Heritage Matters
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2017
Some aspects of our Industrial Heritage
Category: History
Year: 2017
Paycocke’s House: a witness to history
Category: Explore Colne Stour, History
Year: 2017
The House of his Dreams: Reimagining The Munnings Art Museum
Category: Art, Explore Colne Stour, History
Year: 2017
‘The Haunted House’ of Lamarsh – Some Early Reflections
Category: History
Year: 2017
Gainsborough’s House: Celebrating the Past and Looking to the Future
Category: Art, Explore Colne Stour, History
Year: 2017
Another, highly unusual, Suffolk Success Story
Category: Gardens, Nature
Year: 2017
Garden Visits 2017
Category: Gardens, Nature
Year: 2017
Dirty Little Secret
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2017
Website
Category: News
Year: 2017
Editor’s Notes
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2017
Treasurer’s Report
Category: Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2017

2016 - Interesting articles on medieval graffiti, farming in the Stour Valley, exploring our AONB, early settlers from the Stour Valley to America, the archaeology of a local farm, a wonderful catalogue of British birds, celebrating a Suffolk joinery business, the weather from a South African winery. 

Chairmans Letter
Category: Annual
Year: 2016
Medieval Graffiti: the hidden histories…
Category: History
Year: 2016
Stour Valley Farming
Category: Business
Year: 2016
The Godly Kingdom of the Stour Valley
Category: History
Year: 2016
Keeping It Special in the Dedham Vale Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) and Stour Valley Project
Category: Nature
Year: 2016
Lodge Farm, Rectory Road, Wyverstone Street, Suffolk
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2016
A Miscellany of Information about British Birds
Category: Nature
Year: 2016
Another Suffolk Success Story
Category: Business
Year: 2016
Garden Visits
Category: Gardens
Year: 2016
Harvest, Fires and Fynbos
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2016
LOOKING FORWARDS, BEFORE I GET LEFT BEHIND….
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2016
EDITOR’S NOTES
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2016
Annual General Meeting and Summer Party
Category: A.G.M.
Year: 2016
TREASURER’S REPORT
Category: Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2016

2015 - The life and times of a flint knapper. A continuation about the history of the ancient farm at Henny and a visit to the inside of Alston Court, Nayland as well as an insight into The Antiques Roadshow.  

Chairman’s Letter – February 2015
Category: Annual
Year: 2015
Caught Knapping
Category: History
Year: 2015
ALSTON COURT
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2015
ORGANIC MUTTERINGS
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2015
THE STORY OF SPARROW’S FARM, GREAT HENNY – PART 2
Category: History
Year: 2015
ON AND OFF THE ANTIQUES ROADSHOW
Category: Business
Year: 2015
UNLOCKING THE ARTIST WITHIN: FINE ART LANDSCAPE PHOTOGRAPHY
Category: Art, Explore Colne Stour
Year: 2015
BADGERS – LOVE’EM, OR HATE’EM?
Category: Nature
Year: 2015
GARDEN VISITS
Category: Gardens
Year: 2015
FORRESTER VINEYARDS, SOUTH AFRICA
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2015
EDITOR’S NOTES
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2015
TREASURER’S REPORT
Category: Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2015

2014 - A hair-raising flight from UK to South Africa and an insight into the Wineries of Stellenbosch. An exceptional old mill just outside Bures and a most unusual chapel on the hill behind, as well as a time warp farm at Henny. 

Chairman’s Letter – February 2014
Category: Annual
Year: 2014
ST. STEPHEN’S CHAPEL, BURES
Category: History
Year: 2014
THE STELLENBOSCH WINE ROUTE – THE PEOPLE AND THE DOGS!
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2014
THE UPS AND DOWNS OF A FLIGHT TO STELLENBOSCH AND BACK
Category: Adventure. Travel
Year: 2014
A SUFFOLK SUCCESS STORY – JIM LAWRENCE LTD
Category: Business
Year: 2014
HOLD FARM, BURES ST MARY; A RARE TUDOR WATERMILL
Category: Architectural Interest
Year: 2014
THE STORY OF SPARROW’S FARM, GREAT HENNY
Category: History
Year: 2014
YOUR COUNTRYSIDE – FIGHT FOR IT NOW! your Britain fight for it now
Category: Planning Issues
Year: 2014
TUNBRIDGEWARE
Category: History
Year: 2014
EXTENDING THE DEDHAM VALE AREA OF OUTSTANDING NATURAL BEAUTY (AONB) – UPDATE
Category: News, Planning Issues
Year: 2014
GARDEN VISITS
Category: Annual, Gardens
Year: 2014
EDITOR’S NOTES
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2014
TREASURER’S REPORT
Category: Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2014

2013 - Watermills on the Stour. How Constable and Gainsborough would have seen many of the buildings in our area. Let’s protect the Stour Valley by extending the AONB from where we take over from The Dedham Vale at Wormingford towards Sudbury. 

Chairman’s Letter – February 2013
Category: Annual
Year: 2013
THE WATERMILLS OF THE RIVER STOUR
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2013
MANAGING A MASTERPIECE: THE STOUR VALLEY LANDSCAPE PARTNERSHIP
Category: Art, History
Year: 2013
EXTENDING THE DEDHAM VALE AREA OF OUTSTANDING NATURAL BEAUTY (AONB)
Category: Planning Issues
Year: 2013
BUILDINGS IN THE EAST ANGLIAN LANDSCAPE – AS SEEN BY JOHN CONSTABLE
Category: Art, History
Year: 2013
THE ROUND CHURCH AT MAPLESTEAD
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2013
THE FINE WINES OF ENGLAND
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2013
PROGRESS AGAINST PYLONS: A ROUNDUP OF RECENT DEVELOPMENTS IN THE PYLONS SAGA
Category: Planning Issues
Year: 2013
TEA AND THE TEA CADDY A BRIEF STUDY OF THE EARLY HISTORY OF TEA AND ITS CONTAINERS
Category: History
Year: 2013
GARDEN VISITS
Category: Annual, Gardens
Year: 2013
EDITOR’S NOTES
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2013
TREASURER’S REPORT
Category: Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2013

2012 - A walk through many of the churches along the River Stour and how the Romans once lived right here in our midst, and how your pint is brewed. Also the ongoing fight to rid the Stour of the blight of Pylons. 

CHAIRMAN’S LETTER – FEBRUARY 2012
Category: Annual
Year: 2012
TREES R US – AN AMATEUR ARBORETUM
Category: Nature
Year: 2012
GLIMPSES INTO SOME STOUR VALLEY CHURCHES
Category: Explore Colne Stour, History
Year: 2012
THE ART OF BREWING
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2012
PLANNING REFORM
Category: Planning Issues
Year: 2012
‘ELF ‘N SAFETY . . . AND ALL THAT
Category: Explore Colne Stour
Year: 2012
BRINGING OUR PAST TO LIFE: GESTINGTHORPE ROMAN VILLA
Category: History
Year: 2012
MINIATURE OR APPRENTICE PIECE?
Category: History
Year: 2012
GAINSBOROUGH’S VIEW
Category: Art, Explore Colne Stour
Year: 2012
NEW STOUR VALLEY ENVIRONMENT FUND
Category: News
Year: 2012
TREASURER’S REPORT
Category: Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2012
EDITOR’S NOTES
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2012
THE COLNE STOUR COUNTRYSIDE ASSOCIATION. MINUTES OF THE 46TH ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING HELD AT FERRIERS BARN, BURES ON THURSDAY 12TH MAY 2011
Category: A.G.M.
Year: 2012

2011 - The brewers of East Anglia. The gardens of Marks Hall as well as the paintings of Alfred Munnings on display in Sudbury. How a small church became the Cathedral in Bury St Edmunds and all you need to know about antique birdcages. 

CHAIRMAN’S LETTER – APRIL 2011
Category: Annual
Year: 2011
Pylons
Category: Planning Issues
Year: 2011
THE PAINTED CHURCH BECOMES BURY’S CATHEDRAL
Category: History
Year: 2011
MARKS HALL AND THE PHILLIPS PRICE TRUST
Category: History
Year: 2011
BREWING IN EAST ANGLIA
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2011
BURES MILL OVER NINE CENTURIES
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2011
LANDSCAPES BY MUNNINGS EXHIBITION AT GAINSBOROUGH’S HOUSE
Category: Art
Year: 2011
BIRD-CAGES – A FASCINATION
Category: History
Year: 2011
DAWS HALL EVENTS 2011
Category: Annual
Year: 2011
EDITOR’S NOTES
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2011
GARDEN VISITS
Category: Annual, Gardens
Year: 2011
TREASURERS REPORT
Category: Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2011
THE COLNE STOUR COUNTRYSIDE ASSOCIATION. MINUTES OF THE 45TH ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING HELD AT FERRIERS BARN, BURES ON THURSDAY 6TH MAY 2010
Category: A.G.M.
Year: 2011
ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING 2010
Category: A.G.M.
Year: 2011

2010 - An artist who enjoyed his port and a canoe adventure along the Stour. Sudbury’s history and Coggeshall Abbey and a fight to get rid of Pylons from the Stour Valley. 

Chairmans Letter
Category: Annual
Year: 2010
A Pint of Port to Paint a Picture
Category: Art, History
Year: 2010
A Walk Round Coggeshall Abbey
Category: Explore Colne Stour
Year: 2010
By Canoe to Cattawade
Category: Adventure. Travel, Explore Colne Stour
Year: 2010
Nocturnal Visitors
Category: Nature
Year: 2010
Sudbury New Town – c.1330
Category: History
Year: 2010
A Stay in a Nomad’s Tent
Category: Business
Year: 2010
Freeing our countryside of the blight of pylons
Category: Planning Issues
Year: 2010
Hobbies on the Stour
Category: Nature
Year: 2010
Editor’s Notes
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2010
Website
Category: News
Year: 2010
Annual General Meeting 2009
Category: Annual
Year: 2010

2009 - Norwich School art and the Maplesteads. Ancient wallpapers, and is Long Melford the epitome of a Suffolk village? and don’t throw away a rug before checking what it is. 

Chairmans Letter
Category: Annual
Year: 2009
By Hook or by Crook
Category: Art, History
Year: 2009
Unwanted Wildlife – Some Handy Hints
Category: Gardens
Year: 2009
East Ruston Old Vicarage
Category: Gardens
Year: 2009
Squash a Squirrel – Save a Tree
Category: Nature
Year: 2009
Historic Wallpapers and Cole & Son
Category: Business
Year: 2009
Long Melford – ‘Suffolk in a day’
Category: Architectural Interest, Explore Colne Stour, History
Year: 2009
Don’t throw away a fortune!
Category: Business
Year: 2009
Garden Visits. Away Days
Category: Gardens
Year: 2009
Website
Category: Annual
Year: 2009
Editors Notes
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2009
Annual General Meeting 2008
Category: Annual
Year: 2009

2008 - The bell founders of Sudbury and all about a rogue from our area, Sir John Hawkwood, and a Sudbury secret – Gainsborough’s House. 

Member’s Letter
Category: Annual
Year: 2008
Cycling in Suffolk – An Environmental Holiday
Category: Explore Colne Stour
Year: 2008
The Sudbury Bell Founders
Category: History
Year: 2008
The CSCA Website
Category: News
Year: 2008
From Sible Hedingham to Florence. The Remarkable Life of Sir John Hawkwood
Category: History
Year: 2008
‘One of Suffolk’s Best Kept Secrets’- Gainsborough’s House, Sudbury
Category: Art, Explore Colne Stour
Year: 2008
Discovering Historic Wallpaper in East Anglian Houses
Category: History
Year: 2008
The not so humble Mole (Talpa Europaea) and how to catch him
Category: Nature
Year: 2008
Annual Report 2007.
Category: Annual
Year: 2008

2007 - Why a bell had to be chipped to get into the belfry at Lamarsh. Watermills on the Colne and Dragonflies. 

Water Mills on the Upper Colne
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2007
Dragonflies on the Stour
Category: Nature
Year: 2007
Lamarsh Bell Restoration
Category: Architectural Interest
Year: 2007
The CSCA Website
Category: News
Year: 2007
What is wrong with our Horse Chestnuts?
Category: Nature
Year: 2007

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Emma Stewart-Smith

MAGAZINE EDITOR

Christy Simson

CHAIRMAN

Alexander Robson

HON TREASURER

Michael Goodbody

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