The Rolling Stones’ Redlands Drugs Bust

By Victoria Evans, Searchroom Archivist The Rolling Stones in April 1967 (cropped from original) With the upcoming release of ‘Redlands’ at Chichester Festival Theatre (running 20th September to 18th October), we wanted to take this chance to delve deeper into the true story behind the stage adaptation. Looking to the records we hold at the…

West Sussex Unwrapped III: Summer – Chichester Festival Theatre, 1959-1962

Chichester Festival Theatre, 1959-1962 Sixty years ago, in 1962, Chichester's brand new Festival Theatre opened. Looking rather like a mid-century spaceship, the theatre had come into existence so quickly it may have indeed appeared out of thin air. It was the brainchild of optician Leslie Evershed-Martin, who, in just two years, had planned, funded, built,…

West Sussex Unwrapped Week 10: Chichester

We have reached the final week (for now...) of Sussex Unwrapped! It is the turn of Chichester this week, and we thought it would be a great idea to run through the centuries to sum up the history of Chichester as a a market town and cathedral city. Let's see what has changed shall we?…

Historic records and architectural histories: drawings and models

By Tim Hudson (guest blogger) What types of historic documents do architectural historians use? Continuing with our guest written series, the once Editor of the Sussex Victoria County History and co author of the updated Pevsner guide to West Sussex, Tim Hudson, will be exploring the types of records used when researching built heritage. Each…