Higham Ferrers Tourism, Business and Community Partnership

CHICHELE GARDEN FAIR

Saturday 31 May 9am - 3pm 

Venue: Chichele College

FREE ENTRY

A unique and beautiful setting for garden lovers to indulge. Not quite Chelsea, but homespun and community minded. Our annual fair is held in the ancient, walled, medieval-style garden of Chichele College and the adjoining Duchy Barn Garden. A variety of stalls will be selling plants and garden-related fare.

This year, our theme is Tudor Times, with an exhibition of local school children's art in the Chichele College building entitled ‘A View from Chichele College in Tudor Times’. Plus a herb-themed planted wheelbarrow competition for local groups and schools. 

With a steel band, refreshments from the NAAFI van, and willow weaving demonstrations, there is much to enjoy for all ages. Once again, being a Farmer’s Market morning, we shall be accompanied by bell ringing.

MAGNIFICIENT MAPESTRY UNDERGOES A MAKEOVER

Higham Ferrers’s own Bayeux Tapestry is back in the hands of the retired art teacher who designed it. Known as the historic town’s “mapestry” as it features centuries-old houses in the medieval market square and other ancient landmarks, the fabric and thread artwork, created from applique and various embroidery techniques and millions of stitches, took several years to make.

The 1.5-metre long mapestry was the brainchild of former teacher Fay Caddick, who with seven friends – all known as the Material Girls ─ fashioned the unique wall hanging.

“It is our own Bayeux Tapestry as we made it exactly the same as that famous work: first we made separate pieces of the story and then each section was sewn onto a fabric background,” Fay explained.

It was initially displayed in the town’s local library, but when the library closed in 2019, a few years after the mapestry was unveiled, it was decided to move it to the local Henry Chichele Primary School. “But after five years of hanging in the school, we decided that the mapestry was in need of repair,” said Liz Barnatt, chairperson of the Higham Ferrers Tourism Committee, which is supporting the restoration and framing initiative, which is also backed by the Town Council and the Friends of St Mary’s, a secular organisation dedicated to preserving historic buildings and the town’s heritage for future generations.

Brenda Lofthouse and Carol Fitzgerald, chairperson and secretary of the Friends of St Mary’s, collected the mapestry from the school and soon afterwards, Fay started work once again on the mapestry. As all the other Material Girls have moved away from the area, former local French teacher, Therese Easter, volunteered to help.

Fay recalled that after she retired from the Rushden School for Girls (now the Rushden Academy) she used to stroll around the town looking at the historic buildings. That interest and knowledge came in useful when the Material Girls got down to working on the mapestry.

“As well as my local knowledge, we spent a lot of time studying the buildings; the type of stonework and the windows,” she recalled. With the design in her head, Fay had to come up with a way of explaining it to the rest of the Material Girls.

“Initially, we took photographs of the buildings and landmarks and these formed the outline of what we planned to do. Although we only met up in the library for two hours every week, everyone was so keen that the Material Girls all worked on the project at home. We had to find the right pieces of material, which were donated by ourselves and the public”.

Asked about some of the stand-out trees in the mapestry, Fay explained that they had been made from 1960s shaggy rugs. “The mapestry got bigger and bigger over time. People would come into the library where we were working and would suggest places and features to add to the mapestry. It took us nine months to sew the pieces of the story onto the background.”

The repairs are being carried out in the Town Council-backed new Community and Wellbeing Hub at the back of the “old” library building.

Fay and Therese have a September deadline to finish the work so that it can go on display at the Northamptonshire Heritage Forum History Day in Higham Ferrers on Saturday 18 October. It is hoped that the mapestry will find a permanent home in a prominent local building, where it can be viewed by all to see. “We plan to frame the mapestry in Perspex glass to protect it,” Liz Barnatt said.

Town Clerk Alicia Schofield said: “The mapestry is an important and beautiful community fabric artwork and we are pleased to be able to host Fay and Therese at the Community Library and Wellbeing Hub as they undertake their skilled repair work.”

• The Bayeux Tapestry – which depicts the Norman conquest of England in 1066 – hangs in the Bayeux Museum in France. The fragile tapestry is also due to undergo preventive conservation and enhancement. The museum will close later this year and a new museum, featuring the renovated Bayeux Tapestry, will reopen in 2027.

March 2025

A FASCINATING FIND OR A FABULOUS FAKE

AND THE MYSTERY MOUNTS ...

WHEN Higham Ferrers Tourism and its sub-committee Chichele College Management were offered a Stone Age flint axe that had been unearthed in a local field, they jumped at the offer. Always keen to tell stories about historic Higham Ferrers, they knew that the donation would prove an interesting talking point at various exhibitions.

The Town Council was approached by a former resident, Ivan Driver, at last September’s Farmers Market. He told how his boyhood had been spent in Higham Ferrers and that he had several artefacts – including the flint axe – and felt the collection should be returned to the town. Councillor Chris O’Rourke – a member of the Tourism Committee - told him that the committee would be interested in the offer and Carol Fitzgerald, chair of the Chichele College Management Committee, a Tourism sub-committee, agreed and began to consider ways that the artefacts could be shared with the town and kept safe for posterity.

“The flint axe was particularly fascinating. It was found by Jack Thorpe sometime between the world wars. Jack - the father of a close friend of Ivan Driver - lived and farmed at Chichele College in the days when the college was a farm and a farmhouse,” Carol explained. “He uncovered the axe while ploughing a field in the lower end of what is now Vine Hill Drive”.

Believing that the town’s latest treasure should be shared with as many people as possible, the Chichele College Management team contacted the Northamptonshire Council, suggesting that it be considered for A History of Northamptonshire in 100 Objects, an exhibition to be staged at Northampton Museum in September.

“Our application was successful and we are very proud that the axe will be part of the exhibition,” Carol said.

The Higham Ferrers Archaeological Research Society (HiFARS), who meet at Chichele College, were interested in the flint axe, and a member, Professor Sarah Scott, who works at the University of Leicester, suggested it be taken to the university for further research.

And not long afterwards, a busload of interested members of the Tourism Committee, the Chichele College Management Committee and HiFARS, headed off to the university, where the School of Archaeology and Ancient History has an Advanced Microanalysis Laboratory, boasting specialised state-of-the-art equipment.

The equipment- including light microscopes, providing magnifications up to 500 times of an object - enables its world-class, international team of scholars to study the production and use of ancient artefacts and carry out cutting-edge research.

Asked by Carol Fitzgerald if the flint axe was genuine or a fake, Dr Christina Tsoraki, a ground stone and gold expert, said that a lot of things had to be considered and far more investigation was necessary before that could be decided.

Comparative data from different flint stones would have to be gathered. And even if it was not real, it still had a very interesting history, she said.

The axe was made of good quality material and was made by someone who was skilled and had knowledge of different materials.

“It is beautifully made: there has been no use of modern tools in its making,” she said. Carol Fitzgerald added that research was at an interesting stage. “It is all quite exciting, and even if it is a fake, it remains fascinating and will still go into the History of Northamptonshire in 100 Objects exhibition. It will be held for safekeeping at the Archaeological Resource Centre at nearby Chester House, until then”.

As the guest curator of the Higham’s axe display, Carol now awaits the results of the further detailed research before writing the content information for the 100 Objects exhibition.

A copy of the axe will go on display for the first time at Chichele College in June, featuring at an exhibition about The Life of Chichele College being held during Great Big Green Week. It will also form a major part of the Northamptonshire Heritage Forum History Day on 18 October.

February 2025

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