Trelissick House, A Place to Write

KEAP and The Story Republic continue to explore the working world of the writer at Trelissick House and Gardens this autumn.

Commissioned by the National Trust at Trelissick, The Story Republic’s artists, writers and performers are delving deep inside the ledgers, letters and collections to create new stories and artefacts to surprise and delight the visitor. The aim is to encourage everyone to linger and reflect on the place, its history and its place in the wider world; the whole house becomes A Place to Write.

Love letters are brought to life sharing once secret sentences that will stir up the senses. From dusted off diaries we’ve dug out extracts of adventure from foreign explorers and old ship’s logs, tall tales of high seas and plant hunters.

From worn leather ledgers, piles of paperwork list the money made and the mountains of it lost.

A Place to Write can be explored right throughout the downstairs at Trelissick House.

Artists Anthony Crosby and Laura Drayson have created five imaginative writing stations that will be placed throughout the house, enticing visitors to pause, put pen to paper and dive into the history of the house told through the stories and artwork, which inhabit each space.

Every Thursday, from 11am to 3pm writer Mac Dunlop will be in residence to pen poems and love letters.  He will be reading stories and poems and helping willing visitors to craft and capture their own writing adventures.

At weekends the Story Republicans will be performing pop-up poetry, songs and short stories around the house some old and some new written by Annamaria Murphy, Pauline Sheppard and Keith Sparrow.

In the kitchen cafe, there is a photographic exhibition of insightful portraits of Cornish writers in their special writing spaces by well-known photographer Steve Tanner. The images are part of a much wider collection of photography and interviews available in the book A Space to Write. Copies will be on sale in the National Trust Gallery.

Look out for other writing stations around the property.