Tuesday Mornings

 10.15am to 12.15pm
Community Arts Centre
Roaring Meg
Stevenage.
​

Tutor- Tim Parrott

Starts Tuesday 9th January 2024
10 weeks. Cost £40

Iconic buildings and their hidden engineering. 5 weeks

Half term February 13th

This 5 week course will explore the problems and solutions relating to the construction of some of the world’s most beautiful buildings.  
Before anyone could admire their beauty and grandeur, they had first to stand firmly on the ground.  Understanding the basic principles of construction will give us a fresh and exciting perspective on familiar (and new) Ancient, Medieval and Modern buildings.  

We begin with the Pantheon in Rome and Istanbul’s Hagia Sophia. 

20th FEBRUARY 2024

AMAZING BRIDGES TO VISIT. 5 weeks
This second 5 week course focuses on some of the most awe inspiring bridges in the UK, including masterpieces by Telford, Brunel and Stephenson. 

Dramatic stories of human endeavour are woven into the constructional challenges the engineers faced. We begin with Brunel’s bridges at Clifton and Saltash and complete the course in France with the Millau Viaduct.
























 
​
 
  

Thursday Mornings

10.15am to 12.15pm
Community Arts Centre
Roaring Meg
Stevenage.


​
 ​Tutor- Ros Connelly

Perceptions of Venice

10 weeks. Cost £40

Starts Thursday 11th January 2024

Half term February 15th

Venice has excited travellers and writers, politicians and generals, artists and filmmakers, scholars and pleasure seekers. 
It is acknowledged as unique in overcoming its physical limitations and turning them to its advantage; in its crumbling, beautiful hotchpotch of architectural styles; in its 1000 years of Republican government.


Like an oriental pearl in the Adriatic sea, it seems to straddle two worlds; but it has also been described as a theatre, a stage set – showing only a masked face to the world. We are going to reveal what lies beneath the many masks to discover the changing faces of Venice. We will look at how it has presented itself through its architecture and art works; how it has been portrayed in literature, in particular drama; and how its treatment of outsiders, Jews and women has affected how it has been perceived.