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Capel Manor House

Capel Manor House is a house in Horsmonden, Kent, England. A simple glass-and-steel house in the style of Mies van der Rohe, it is seen as one of the most important examples of modernist architecture in Britain and Britains answer to the Barcelona Pavilion. In September, 2013, English Heritage and Britains Minister of Culture, Ed Vaizey, listed the house at Grade II*, joining just 5.5% of all listed buildings It became one of only 0.18% of postwar buildings to be listed. Designed by the British architect Michael Manser and completed in 1971, the house was commissioned by John Howard, private personal secretary to Prime Minister Edward Heath, who wanted a modern labour-saving house to replace the existing 26-bedroom mansion. Writing in the Financial Times, Edwin Heathcote described Mansers contribution thus: "Mansers own designs for houses, dozens of works of great modernist clarity throughout south-east England, showed what was possible – how modernism could be integrated into a seemingly resistant English landscape. His Capel Manor House is exquisite, a crystalline glass box atop the ruined podium of an old Victorian manor house." Jane Austen’s forebears once lived on the same spot, near Sissinghurst in the Kentish Weald, as did her descendant Frederick Austen, who owned a 26-bedroom house built in the 19th century in the Italianate Gothic style. The grand country home is thought not to have been lived in after being occupied by an army unit during the Second World War, and was demolished in 1969 and a 2,000 sq ft steel and entirely glass-fronted house, intended as a weekend bolthole, shot up, phoenix-like, from the rubble-strewn site. Mansers new house was revered as a modernist icon and featured in dozens of design journals around the world. It was featured in Vogue and House Garden in 1971. A scale model of the house, kept at the Royal Institute of British Architects, has been exhibited at the Victoria and Albert Museum. Manser had been inspired by the modernist architect Mies van der Rohe’s elegant, boxy 1929 Barcelona Pavilion, and the two buildings share many characteristics. In contrast to their minimalist structure, both have interiors that featuring luxurious and high-quality materials. Their transparent facades aim to fuse indoors and out. Each building has a pool; at Capel Manor it’s where the old house’s colonnaded orangery used to be. Capel Manor is a refinement of the Miesian box – a glass envelope enclosing space with the lightest of touches. However Mansers interests were as much in Palladio and the Golden Section rectangle as they were in recent precedents. The house demonstrates Mansers interest in precise geometry and his acute awareness of the modern nature of his materials. The steel frame of the building is revealed both internally and externally, where the roof projects over the pavilion walls, and the glazing meets at the corners without the use of mullions. The sunken living area breaks up the large central space, without disturbing the views into the garden, which are maximised throughout the house with the simplicity of both the buildings structure, and its floor plan. The garden thus feels exceptionally close and the house immaculate and precise in its Arcadian setting. The house was carefully planned to formally address the retained elements of the old Victorian Capel Manor which the new house replaced; the remains of the winter garden seeming like a crumbly Classical ruin juxtaposed with the razor-sharp modern classicism of the house. However, what is most remarkable about the position of the house is its elevation above the treed landscape which extends into the distance beyond it, providing, as noted in the Architectural Review: the emotional bonuses which this unique hilltop penthouse has to offer. The diminutive scale of the house in relation to the surrounding landscape is also striking, and the way in which the current owners have increased the floor space through the addition of a detached annex, rather than a more traditional extension, has proved a sensitive and successful approach. Capel Manor is noted by Neil Jackson in his book, The Modern Steel House, and is significant in the British and international tradition of modern steel houses. Manser developed his interest in framed structures through a succession of houses, starting with a timber-framed house built for himself, and progressing on to steel. He became recognised as the most prolific architect of steel houses in Britain in the late 1950s and 1960s, and was one of the most important in the field. Capel Manor is arguably the most sophisticated of his houses and among the best known. Certainly it is Mansers personal favourite. The building was proposed for listing at Grade II* in 2012 in recognition of the widely held view that this is Mansers best house. It was built at a time when he had honed his approach to framed-house building, resulting in a sophisticated and successful version of the type. In addition, the house was considered exceptional amongst its peers both because of its site, and in the way it responds to it. In a house with so strong and simple a concept, the sensitive replacement of internal and external finishes, and the careful reorganisation of internal space, has had no impact on the character and quality of the building.

K College

K College was a college of Further Education and Higher Education with facilities across Kent, formed in April 2010, by the merger of South Kent College with West Kent College. In the academic year beginning 2009, it had 25,290 students between its 6 campuses, at Jemmett Road and Henwood in Ashford, Dover, Folkestone, Tonbridge and Royal Tunbridge Wells. The Interim Principal was Phil Frier and the Patron was Lord Mayhew of Twysden. Due to the large amount of debt sustained by K College, it was split into two units from 1 August 2014: Hadlow College Group has taken over the Tonbridge and Tunbridge Wells campuses as "West Kent College" and Ashford campus as "Ashford College". East Kent College has taken over Folkestone and Dover. Most staff at the Folkestone & Dover campuses were transferred under TUPE to East Kent College. Staff based at Ashford, Tonbridge & Tunbridge Wells remained with K College and were based at either West Kent College or Ashford College from 1 August. In July 2014 prior to Hadlow College managing Ashford, Tonbridge & Tunbridge Wells campuses K College announced that there would be up to 127 redundancies of those not TUPEd to East Kent College. In comparison, East Kent College have recruited at least 40 extra staff since taking over the Folkestone & Dover campuses.
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