Thursday 27 September 2012

Ceremony to mark progress on The Keep

Another major step is about to be taken in the construction of a new £19m historical resource centre for East Sussex and Brighton & Hove.

Early next month, the project partners will gather at the site of ‘The Keep' at Woollards Field, Mouslecoomb, near Falmer to mark the completion of the roof of the building.

East Sussex County Council, Brighton & Hove City Council and the University of Sussex are working in partnership to provide the new archive centre, which is due to open to the public by the end of 2013.

The partners will officially mark the completion of the roof at a ‘topping out' ceremony at the site at 9.15am on Monday 1 October 2012.

Representatives of the partners at the ceremony will include Peter Jones, Leader of East Sussex County Council, Councillor Jason Kitkat, Leader of Brighton & Hove City Council and Professor Michael Farthing, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Sussex. Phil Durigan, the MD of Kier Construction, will also be attending.

Councillor Tony Freebody, Lead Member for Community Services at the County Council, who will also be at the ceremony, said: “The Keep will be the new home for thousands of archives and historical resources dating back over 900 years.

“The public centre will enable people to research their local and family history and provide opportunities for school visits and a wide range of activities and facilities for everyone to use. It will be a wonderful resource for everyone in East Sussex and Brighton & Hove.”

Janita Bagshawe, Head of Royal Pavilion and Museums at Brighton & Hove City Council, said: “The Keep is on course to meet BREEAM Excellent and will provide a state of the art building for housing collections and ensuring their long term care to enable generations to come to learn from them.

“It will bring together in one place a range of collections from the city and county and provide for the first time opportunities for learners to work with a range of archive and museum resources.”

Professor Michael Farthing, University of Sussex Vice-Chancellor, said: “The Keep is an excellent collaboration and means that our own internationally acclaimed Special Collections archive, which includes the Mass Observation diaries and precious original manuscripts of Virginia Woolf and Rudyard Kipling, will benefit from shared archival and conservation expertise.”

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