Francis Terry (left) and Digby Harris (right) at the 2026 AGM.
Our Annual General Meeting was held at St Mary’s Church Hall in Beverley. Proceeds started with the annual “Year in Review” Video, followed by the annual reports and voting.
Our Guest Speaker was architect Francis Terry who gave a lecture titled “In The Footsteps of Vanbrugh”. The presentation included Mr Terry’s drawings which reconstruct Vanbrugh’s partially completed plan for Stowe House and some images of a recent project based on Vanbrugh’s Temple of the Four Winds. The main interest of the talk however was the reconstruction of the Tapestry Drawing Room at Castle Howard which won the 2025 Georgian Group Award for Restoration of a Georgian Interior. This project required the highest level of craftsmanship including wood carving and decorative plaster work. It was also one of the last projects of the interior decorator Alec Cobbe CVO, who died in March.
Reconstruction by Francis Terry of the appearance of Stowe House as intended by Sir John Vanbrugh.
Francis Terry working on a full size drawing of the Tapestry Drawing Room at Castle Howard.
The swag in the style of Grinling Gibbons, designed for Castle Howard by Francis Terry.
The Tapestry Drawing Room, designed by Francis Terry at Castel Howard.
The marble effect scaglia fire surround designed by Francis Terry at Castle Howard.