News across the Commonwealth

The Commonwealth Heritage Forum’s Queen Elizabeth II Heritage Skills Training Programme, generously funded by £4.5m from the Hamish Ogston Foundation, has commissioned a Vision Statement for works on Roxburgh House, Gardens, and Herbarium in Kolkata. Roxburgh is one of the main priorities for action under our Commonwealth Heritage at Risk Programme and is already featured on our website.

20-year restoration project completes at former British Residency, the first of 20 projects under the Queen Elizabeth II Platinum Jubilee Commonwealth Heritage Skills Training Programme, a £4.5million Commonwealth-wide conservation programme funded by the Hamish Ogston Foundation. The Reception, held on Saturday 14 January celebrated the completion of the final phase of restorative work at Osmania Women’s University College in Hyderabad, once the British Residency and one of the most important European heritage buildings at risk in India.

The CHS Training Programme has awarded 6 Hamish Ogston Foundation Commonwealth Traineeships to fund the attendance of 6 UK-based participants on the course. They will join Trainees from Tulane University and the University of the West Indies in Barbados, 3–17 January. Based at Roebuck Street, Bridgetown, the training course will develop a heritage conservation management plan for this 650-meter historic street.

The Architectural Conservation Traineeship in Hyderabad was a hugely positive learning experience for all involved. The Traineeship was coordinated with the World Monuments Fund and was the first overseas project under the Commonwealth Heritage Skills Training Programme.

Francis Maude, Director at Donald Insall Associates in London, describes the late 19th century City Hall in Georgetown, Guyana, and its connections with civic architecture in Britain. This conservation project also provides a good example of the benefits of collaborative partnerships, training workshops and formal sponsorship.

Encouraging news from Kolkata. Three landmark historic buildings have been restored for public exhibitions. Metcalfe Hall, opened in 1844, has been repaired in traditional lime plaster by the Archaeological Survey of India. Belvedere House has emerged from a five-year restoration programme with an exhibition celebrating Icons of Indian Nationalism. In the heart of the city, the old Currency Building has been refurbished for a jute and silk exhibition and fashion show.

Recollecting chapters of Delhi’s architectural evolution in the twentieth century, one undoubtedly recalls the events that took place in 1911 and 1947.

A fascinating article describing the outcome of recent archaeological excavations of a site in Jamaica occupied by successive generations of the Tainos.

The CHS Training Programme has now awarded 6 Hamish Ogston Foundation Commonwealth Traineeships to fund the attendance of 6 UK-based participants on the course. They will join 6 local participants for the start of the two week programme in Hyderabad on Thursday, 6 October. Based at the spectacular Osmania Womens’ University College, (the former British Residency), they will develop hands-on heritage skills helping to repair and restore the three monumental gateways and the central mall of one of India’s most important buildings at risk.

Having secured statutory protection for over I200 historic buildings in the city, the Heritage Foundation of Pakistan (HFP) has organised a major initiative in Karachi. Under expert supervision, local community volunteers have been mobilised to clean the facades of the city’s fine historic buildings. Starting with the Victorian Gothic Denso Hall (above), built in 1886, […]

The Ghana Museums and Monuments Board (GMMB) is one of the sovereign institutions established when the Gold Coast colony became independent of British rule in 1957. Its mandate of preservation of the material cultural heritage...

Marking Her Majesty The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, the biggest-ever Commonwealth heritage project was recently announced at the HQ of the Barbados National Trust as part of a Conference of the Islands.