Then & Now

1967-2021 Norton Priory. In the years following the moment when the Brooke family left the house in 1921, the house was almost completely demolished in 1928 yet the undercroft was retained and roofed with a cap of concrete. In 1966 the current Sir Richard Brooke gave Norton Priory in trust for the benefit of the public. The original black and white photos were a document of the state of the site following hand a century of dereliction. Four years later in 1971 J. Patrick Greene was given a contract to carry out a six-month excavation for Runcorn Development Corporation as part of a plan to develop a park in the centre of Runcorn New Town. What followed would eventually become the most extensively excavated monastic site in Europe, with one of the UK's most iconic museums and gardens at it's heart. The first image shows the 12th century grade I listed medieval undercroft, the last surviving section above ground of both the original priory and the subsequent house of the same name. The undercroft was left open to the elements for many years until it was later sympathetically restored and the museum built around it for permanent protection. The second image shows the summer house or 'garden loggia', a grade II listed structure in yellow sandstone, possibly designed by James Wyatt in the late 18th century. Situated in the Brookes family gardens, having been left open to the elements for half a century. Nature had all but consumed the structure until it was later re-landscaped.