2023
Christmas Cards 2023
This year’s Christmas card is a view of Holland House from the formal gardens’. It is a view we all know well and combines two of the best loved features of the park. It is again by Clare Weatherill, who has also painted our popular card “Holland House through the Trees”, which we sell throughout the year.
The standard greeting on all Christmas cards is “With best wishes for Christmas and the New Year”, but you can choose to ask for them blank. We hold a supply of these cards, with greetings, in three options:
• Large, 152 mm x 197 mm format at £6.50 for five
• Small, 118 mm x 168 mm at £11.00 for ten.
• Mixed packs of ten designs of Holland Park from past years, at £6.50. These will be mostly the large size and in three or four different designs.
All of these are in stock from now and can be quickly delivered.
In addition, there is a range of other Holland Park cards, which you can find on Mountbatten’s website, mountbattencards.com . Members may be especially interested to see two versions of the view of the café, pre and post the new café terrace layout, which was completed in 2018.
It would be a great help if you could order early, so that the publisher knows what initial printing he needs.
If your newsletter is hand-delivered (no stamp,) our delivery of Christmas cards is free. If your newsletter is delivered by post, we have to charge an additional £2.50 per ten small cards or a single pack of five large. If you are unsure whether you are in the free delivery area, please ask rhoddy.wood@virgin.net. Please note that sending the order to The Friends instead of direct to Mountbatten gets the Friends an extra discount, unless overprinting is required. If you do order direct, please remember to say which charity you would like Mountbatten to make a donation to; naturally we would hope it was The Friends, but you are free to choose any charity.
Rhoddy Wood
[September 2023]
Christmas Concert
Sunday 10 December in the Holland Park Orangery. 7.30pm
We hope you already have the date of our Christmas Concert in your diary. Douglas Somers-Lee will entertain us with his Ariel Consort of London this year. Douglas has sung in the Tallis Chamber Choir for many years and shared conducting with Philip Simms in 2021 and 2022, so you will recognise him. You will notice some familiar faces among the singers and there will be new singers from the Ariel choir.
Douglas has been planning the programme for us and tells us that: ‘It will include some Christmas favourites, with a dash of music from Advent. As always, there will be the opportunity for the audience to raise their voices to some familiar tunes.’ We will of course miss Philip Simms and Lizzy Groves after all these years of glorious music, but we are reassured that our Christmas Concert can continue in a form that is familiar and appreciated.
After the concert we will be treated to delicious canapés and a glass or two of wine. Please don’t leave it until the last minute to book, as that makes it difficult for us to plan.
Tickets at £27 can be ordered online HERE.
[November 2023]
Festive event in Holland Park
On Saturday, 2 December, The Friends will be running a festive pop-up stall in Holland Park’s Café Yard. We will be there to catch up with members and other visitors to the park, and will have Christmas cards for sale, as well as tea towels printed with pretty paintings of either wild flowers or autumn berries. There is also a jute shopper with a tree design, and note cards, all of which make lovely Christmas gifts. Tasty festive treats from the Holland Park Café will also be on sale on our stall.
Just to add to the excitement, two of the Met’s police on horseback hope to visit us. There will be carrots available for children to feed to the horses, provided adults check first with the police riders.
Rassells has provided a festive fir tree, which will become our ‘wishing tree’. Some people are less fortunate and do not have a friend or relative to wish them well over the festive season. Any visitor to our stall can write a best wishes message on the coloured labels provided and tie it onto the tree.
Once it is decorated with best wishes labels, the tree will be donated to a local charity or care home.
Come and say ‘hello’. We will be at the stall from 10am to 3.00pm.
Text & photo by Jennie Kettlewell
[November 2023]
Christmas cards and Christmas presents
When you are thinking of small presents to give family and friends, do have a look at what The Friends have on sale. There are two cotton tea towels; one showing paintings of some of the flowers that grow wild in Holland Park and the other with paintings of autumn fruits in the park. The greetings cards ‘Holland House through the trees’ make an excellent gift, as does the handy jute shopper decorated with a tree motif.
All are available to buy from the Park Reception Office in the Stable Yard or from our website under Merchandise.
There is a selection of Holland Park Christmas cards, with a new design for this year, ‘Holland House from the formal gardens’. It is a view we all know well and combines two of the best loved features of the park. It is again by Clare Weatherill, who painted the card ‘Holland House through the Trees’. Christmas cards are available from the Park Reception Office, or they can be purchased online. Prices of all our cards and merchandise are under the Merchandise heading.
The local retailers in our Friends & Neighbours discount scheme offer lots of ideas for presents: stylish gifts from The Design Museum shop, presents for the home from Lipp, plants and flowers from Rassells, and picture framing from Gallery 19. The Kensington Health Club and Spa offers beauty treatments. Or enjoy some holiday cheer at one of the restaurants and cafés in our scheme. The Holland Park Café has festive chocolates, Florentine biscuits, mince pies, stollen logs, gingerbread trees and more. All the participants in our programme support us with a special price for our members’ and we should support the participants in return. A full list of our Neighbours and discounts offered is on the Friends’ website.
Jennie Kettlewell
[November 2023]
CANCELLED
Holland Park Quiz Night!
Thursday 26 October, 7- 9pm, in the Holland Park Orangery
We thought we would try something new for our autumn event, so we are running a Quiz Night, based on Holland Park, past and present.
Small groups will sit around tables, so they can discuss answers to each question amongst themselves before marking their choice from three possible answers on the quiz sheets provided. Professional quiz master, Ben Millington-Buck, will ensure the questions are clear and encourage lots of conversation and fun at the tables. It’s not a test! Answers will be read out at the end.
Crisps and similar snacks will be provided on each table, together with wine and soft drinks. Entrance will be via the car park gate in Abbotsbury Road and parking is free after 6.30pm. Do join us, but please arrive on time, as the gates to the car park will be closed promptly once the event starts.
Tickets, at £15, can be ordered online HERE.
[September 2023]
History of Holland House and the people who lived there
Sunday 8 October 2.30-4pm
Come and hear fascinating stories about the long history of Holland House and what went on there – scandals and all. The tour will be led by Blue Badge Guide, Leila Sukiur. It is the first time you will be able to get a close-up view of the recent conservation work on the exterior of the building since the opera vacated the site. There is no entry to the house itself, as it is a shell since the bombing in 1940.
To book a ticket online, click HERE or contact Jennie Kettlewell on 020 7243 0804 or email jennie.kettlewell@thefriendsofhollandpark.org
£10.00 per person. The meeting point will be shown on your ticket.
[Sept 2023]
Summer party in the park
We’ve had the rain, so now it’s time for the sun to come out and what better way to celebrate summer than to come to The Friends’ party in the park. The date is Tues. 18 July. The time is 6-8pm and the place is the marquee at the east end of the Dutch Garden. Access is from the Dutch Garden only.
There will be refreshing Pimm’s fruit cup, tasty canapés and good company, all with the lovely view of the Dutch Garden summer planting. We are most grateful to James Clutton, CEO of Opera Holland Park, for allowing us once again to borrow their marquee on the raised terrace to the east of the Dutch Garden. Come rain or shine, we will be protected from anything the weather will throw at us.
This is the one event of our year that is only open to Friends and their immediate guests, but not the general public. Do come and celebrate with us! The car park is free after 6.30pm.
Tickets, at £25 each, can be booked online HERE.
[June 2023]
Dates for your Diary
The events listed below are either organised by The Friends (F), or organised by the Ecology Service (ES), most of which are sponsored by The Friends.
Sat. 30 Sept. Bird ringing demonstration in the Wildlife Enclosure.
Free to attend. Must book. ES 7-11am
Check for an update on Ecology Service events (ES): Holland Park Ecology Centre Events/ Eventbrite
Ecology Service events can be booked on Eventbrite. Please note that events will not be posted on Eventbrite until around 8 weeks before the date.
Holland Park Conservation Volunteers (adults) meet on the third Saturday of each month from 10.30am to 3.30 pm. Tasks focus on practical conservation that helps deliver the Ecology Service management plan and might include dead-hedging, scything, pond clearing and maintaining the paths in the Wildlife Enclosure. If you want to join, or find out more, please email Gerry Kelsey, idverde’s Training and Community Manager, at Gerald.Kelsey@idverde.co.uk.
[August 2023]
Tours of Holland Park
Expert Blue Badge Guides will entertain you with fascinating stories about the long history of Holland Park and what went on there – scandals and all.
Tues 20 June. 2.30-4pm. The history of Holland Park's gardens. This will be the first for this subject. Guide Leila Sukiur. Click HERE to book online.
Book online or contact Jennie Kettlewell on 020 7243 0804 or on jennie.kettlewell@thefriendsofhollandpark.org
£10.00 per person. Meeting point will be shown on the ticket.
[February 2023]