By Giuseppe Albano, Director, Trent Park House of Secrets
I officially began as Director of Trent Park House of Secrets on 2 June 2025, though my journey had already begun a few days earlier. On 30 May I had the privilege of representing the Trent Park Museum Trust at a seminar at St John’s College, Oxford, hosted by Professor William Whyte and presented by the distinguished Princeton scholar and curator Esther da Costa Meyer. Titled ‘Cousins, Collectors, Curators: Philip Sassoon and Hannah Gubbay’, the seminar brought together academics and curators working across the fields of collecting, cultural history and heritage. It offered a compelling lens through which to reflect on the legacy of Philip Sassoon, and a fitting prelude to my first few weeks ahead.
Later that weekend I had the opportunity to visit the splendid Houghton Hall in Norfolk for the first time. Our Co-Chair, David Cholmondeley — a descendant of the Sassoon family through his grandmother Sybil, Philip Sassoon’s sister — offered a personal tour of the grandest rooms of his family home, where I saw some of the artworks that once belonged to Sassoon. Thanks to the generosity of our Co-Chair some of these pieces are now earmarked to join our displays as long-term loans and are coming home, in a sense, to Trent Park House. Seeing them in their current setting, surrounded by one of the most elegant country houses in England, offered an inspiring vision of the kind of experience we are working to create at Trent Park: a House of Secrets not only in reference to the labyrinthine wartime underworld hidden in the basement, but also to the interwar salons that took place in its handsome staterooms adorned with Sassoon’s collections of fine and decorative art, where leading politicians and cultural icons of the day once gathered.
My first month as Director was bookended by another visit of significance: at the start of July I was welcomed to Bletchley Park for a thorough behind-the-scenes tour by its CEO, Iain Standen, who has led the transformation of Bletchley and advised Trent Park Museum Trust in its formative years. Given the crucial roles both sites played in gathering intelligence during the Second World War, I greatly look forward to working with Iain and the Bletchley Park team in the months and years ahead.
My earlier visit to Houghton, meanwhile, gave me much to reflect on in relation to our own plans for the café and shop at Trent Park. I was struck by how seamlessly the café and shop had been integrated into the historic setting and overall visitor experience at Houghton Hall. Together, they exemplify the high standards we aim to achieve at Trent Park House, where the initial stages of planning our own café and gift shop has been a focus of my first weeks in post. Spending time on site and off, I have been reflecting on how these key spaces will look and feel, how they will operate day to day, and how they can offer a distinctive welcome to our visitors. I have been fortunate to work closely with our Trustee Mark Pemberton, whose operational expertise developed over many years at English Heritage has been invaluable, and with our catering consultant, Adrian Downhill, and retail consultant, Selina Fellows, as we begin to shape two visitor spaces that are functional, inviting, and true to the spirit of Trent Park House.
I am especially excited about the Trent Park House café, which we’re planning to locate in the Blue Room; a large, light-filled space overlooked by a Rex Whistler mural and opening onto the building’s East Terrace. In addition to the logistics and practicalities, we have been contemplating the tone of the café’s atmosphere and identity, where country house splendour fuses with classic English tastes of the 1920s and 30s. The next step in the process will be to identify the right catering partner to bring our vision to life. The gift shop, to be located at the other end of the House in the Green Room, is equally important as it will form a first and lasting impression for our visitors and will be filled with the kind of items they want to buy as mementoes of their visit to Trent Park.
During my first month I’ve been getting to know colleagues across the project, some of them recently appointed, while others have been collaborating with us for several years. I have enjoyed working with the architectural historian Simon Thurley and his team from Architrave Historical Services — Tori Reeve, Chezzy Brownen and Kate Francis — who are leading on the planning, interpretation and installation of our permanent exhibition across two floors of the House. Our Learning Consultants, Tali Krikler and Caroline Marcus, are developing the House’s Clore Learning Space with imagination and care, creating a vital resource for schools and community groups. Cynthia Wainwright, our fundraising consultant, and Lauren Gildersleve, who leads on our communications, are each playing a vital role in preparing the ground for the House’s public launch. Finally, I wish to thank our tremendously supportive Board of Trustees, led by Co-Chairs Jason Charalambous and David Cholmondeley, for making me feel so welcome and for the exceptional work they have achieved over the last decade since the founding of Trent Park Museum Trust. It’s a privilege to have joined the Trust at this pivotal moment as we prepare to open to the public next year.
It has been deeply inspiring to spend so much time on site as our beautiful building comes back to life. Over the past few weeks the scaffolding has been coming down, revealing the warm, luminous glow of the brickwork beneath. We are all grateful to our key stakeholder Berkeley Homes, who are overseeing the building work and development of this treasured site.
With the external work nearing completion and the house beginning to reveal its character once more, we now turn our attention to the restoration of the interiors and to our next major chapter. In the weeks ahead we’ll be launching our National Lottery Heritage Fund-supported project Sharing Stories: Connecting Trent Park House with Enfield’s Communities, and inviting our friends and supporters to become Founding Patrons of Trent Park House of Secrets. I want to thank everyone who has contributed so generously with time, insight, energy and encouragement, including those who have already signed up as volunteers (although we still need many more). Your support has brought us to this point, and it will carry us forward as we bring the House fully back to life and open its doors to the public.
