Full details about opening times and all events being held at Valentines Mansion and Gardens are available from the council’s website at www.valentinesmansion.com. You can also find out about hiring the Mansion for your wedding, reception, ceremony or corporate event by calling 020 8708 8100 or email hiringvalentines@visionrcl.org.uk
Forthcoming Friends’ Events
Anyone is very welcome at all our events but membership offers
discounted prices to “Friends” so why not join us !
We celebrated our 20th Anniversary with an Open Day in February.
Our May , June and July events were postponed . The Mansion resumed Open Days on 24 August and we supported Mrs Inglebey’s McMillan coffee morning in September . Watch this space for our next event.
Forthcoming Mansion Events
EXHIBITIONS in the Mansion Gallery – Sundays & Mondays 10:30am – 4 pm Free entry
Endangered by Jason Rose Mansion Artist
Centred around the environmental crisis and endangered species of plants, animals and humans, artist Jason Rose has created a collection of artwork highlighting the interconnections between these groups and the planet we all share. Read more ….
From 28 Sep to 2 Nov 2020
Past Friends’ Events
The Best of the Last 20 Years
The Friends Of Valentines Mansion have clocked up 20 years of fundraising and celebrating the preservation of Redbridge’s most beautiful community asset. 2020 will be a year of revisiting some of the most memorable events, coupled with an ambitious plan to recruit 200 new Friends and looking forward to the next twenty years.
OUR VALENTINES 20th Anniversary Celebration – 26 February 2020
MUSIC, MERRIMENT & MINCE PIES – Thursday 5 December 2019 7.30pm
Our Christmas celebration 2019 was in three contrasting parts. The ice was broken as members and their guests enjoyed drinks and nibbles in the Gallery to the accompaniment of the delightful Roding Consort of recorders.
Then it was upstairs to the Drawing Room for a recital of Christmas songs, both old and new, by the Crofton Singers. They were magnificent and this was undoubtedly a highlight of the evening.
Finally over further refreshments downstairs, and after a bit of a slow start, there was considerable amusement as participants related tales of family customs and reminisced about Christmases past. Thus we now know, for example, that one of our committee members has pork pie for breakfast on Christmas Day, whilst another remembers making paper chains out of newspaper.
The seasonal decorations at the Mansion both inside and out were absolutely beautiful and it made an even lovelier backdrop than usual for this event. Gail Ellisdon
AN EVENING WITH VIVYAN ELLACOTT – 17 October 2019, 7.30pm
It was almost standing room only at this year’s talk – ‘My life in the theatre’ by Vivyan Ellacott. And what a talk it was! Vivyan skilfully took us through his career using anecdotes about his experiences and people he met along the way.
As a boy his first love was variety, engendered by his meeting artistes from the Empire Theatre Swansea who came into his mother’s grocery store to collect their post-war rations. This led to small parts in panto and even one in Under Milk Wood where he actually had two lines.
Various short-term stage management jobs whilst an undergraduate in London and subsequent directorial and acting roles, plus stints abroad, widened his horizons and he came to appreciate all genres of theatre. Thus he was well qualified to become involved in the design of Ilford’s Kenneth More Theatre, and its first manager. His contract with the theatre, where he stayed 36 years, allowed him to freelance, and during this time he took several successful shows on tour and flirted with West End management amongst other things.
This was a thoroughly exhilarating talk, though Vivyan hit a more serious note during the Q & A session when he reflected on the future of the Kenneth More Theatre and on the lives of youngsters supported by a charity in Romania, which is now one of his main retirement interests. Special thanks must go to Vivyan for not only providing such an entertaining evening but also for donating his fee to FoVM. Gail Ellisdon
WHODUNNITS AND DOUGHNUTS – Thursday 16 May 2019, 2.30 pm
………. A packed Morning Room was the scene for the Friends’ event, Whodunnits and Doughnuts. During the first half Ian Selby, gave an informative presentation based on a wide variety of writers of crime fiction. The Mansion felt a perfect setting for such a subject. 
No stone was left unturned at this event which was aimed at show-casing the Mansion and the Friends’ involvement in it.
From a ‘design a dinner plate’ competition for children to the proffering of Black Hamburg grapes, all aspects of the house were on display. Information boards and costumed interpreters gave a comprehensive view of the house and its restoration whilst events, visits and talks organised by the Friends and items purchased by them for the Mansion were highlighted. There was a tricky quiz about various occupants of Valentines which concentrated the minds of even the most knowledgeable amongst us and, of course, tea and cakes in the drawing room! Dozens came including the Deputy Mayor and local councillors, and all showed a keen interest in what was on offer with many avowing to join the Friends as a result of what they had experienced.
