The Knutsford Heritage Open Day at The Courthouse

Ellie Heaps | 25th September 2017

The Courthouse, Knutsford, Cheshire was delighted to be selected as one of the feature venues for this years Knutsford Heritage open days. This is one of England’s largest and most diverse festivals dedicated to English heritage. From the 7-10th of September The Courthouse was the focal point of the festival.

The Courthouse reopened its doors in July the team at Flat Cap Hotel’s took on ambitious and complete renovation of place. The now Barristers Restaurant and Bar serves locally sourced, seasonal dishes produced by Executive Chef, Steven Tuke. The Court Room has been converted into one of the largest ballrooms in South Cheshire which is ideal for large events, exhibitions, weddings and conferences with a banqueting capacity for 250 guests.

The open day was celebrating the life and legacy of Sir Alan Turing and was an absolute success. They were also exploring the history and heritage of LGBTQ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Queer) in the wider community as well as looking at the life of Manchester’s war-time code breaker.

One of the reasons behind The Courthouse being chosen for the historic location was because it was 65 years since Turing was tried at the former Sessions Court in Knutsford for homosexual acts.

On Friday the 8th and Saturday the 9th of September they hosted an impressive sold out live theatre re-enactment of Turing’s trial from 1952. Which was hosted in the original Court room within The Courthouse.

Earlier in the day Sir Dermont Turing gave a talk on his uncles legacy to a full house. He spoke about his uncles extraordinary work, privet life and his arrest for gross indecency.

A fascinating virtual reality experience of his trial was created by RE-DOCK and LGBTQ artist’s across Greater Manchester which was also held at the Court house and free of charge to attend.

The VR performance allowed visitors the rare opportunity to explore different view points of the trial and also Turing’s work.

The Courthouse held host to a special celebrity judge and lawyer Rob Rinder. He took to the stage to read the court sessions records.

There was also talks with Paul Kellar MBE where he was discussing ‘The brilliance of the Turing-Weichman Bombe’ and Jonathan Swinton who spoke about ‘Life, you will lose a lover when I die.’

Whilst Judge Rinder was reading out the court sessions record’s an Enigma expert provided guests with a demonstration of the remarkable machine on a replica Enigma machine. An Enigma machine is actually a piece of spook hardware used during World War Two. It was actually created by a German but used by Britain’s codebreakers as a way of deciphering signals traffic.

A co-founder of Flat Cap Hotels, Oliver Heywood commented “It has been an amazing weekend here at The Courthouse. We are extremely proud of the restoration and refurbishment of the former Crown Courts and it was great to open our doors to allow the public in once again to see the stunning property.” He follows on to say “The event was a great community wide celebration and we were delighted to be part of the engaging programme.”

 

The Courthouse Hotel

Toft Road,

Knutsford,

Cheshire WA16 0PB