All About The Girl

J and I had decided to give ourselves a break after a very busy day previously and go into town and go around an exhibition at the Bar Convent that we had been meaning to for some time. Naturally, starting out with coffee and cake.

If you've time, I'll play kiss-and-tell...

The back story to this is quite interesting and in fact J had been to school in what was then the Bar Convent School for Girls. The convent in itself had been established in 1686, so historically it has been a very important part of the story of York. In the mid-80s, the school separated from the convent when it became a co-ed – All Saints School. In fact all of our four girls ended up at the school enjoying what we felt was a really great state education.

Of course when the convent separated from the school, it then stopped getting the educational grant funding from the diocese and to be honest it really started to struggle financially. Anyway, the story goes that the man in charge, Sister Agatha, got her "thinking hat" on and dreamt up the idea of renovating a large part of the convent. Her idea was to open it to the public as an exhibition about the convent and specifically about the life of Mary Ward, the nun who established the convent and also celebrating the life of Saint Margaret Clitheroe, who was martyred in York for her Catholic faith.

Sister Agatha had, before becoming a nun, been a society deb from a very wealthy background. Apparently, she was not averse to drawing on her family connections and she happened to be on a train going somewhere and bumped into one of the Rothschilds. Bold brass, she explained the financial difficulties the convent was facing, and a very large cheque was forthcoming. Renovations began.

It is an absolutely fabulous and thought-provoking exhibition. Brilliantly curated, I would recommend it to anyone visiting the city. Understandably, it certainly brought floods of memories back for J. This image is the staircase which J and her classmates would tramp up and down between classrooms. The pictures now on the walls are 50 copies of paintings held in Augsburg Museum in Germany depicting the life of Mary Ward.

One of the windows in the exhibition looks out onto Blossom Street ("Ploxham Street", back in the day) and I must say that window view in particular brought back lots of memories for both of us. J and I met at a club during the summer between the lower sixth and upper sixth form years (I was at the lads' school a bit away from the convent school) and me two of my mates (who just happen to be going out with two of J's friends. *Sigh* Something about a convent girl...) used to walk along this part of the street a couple of times a week to the squash courts in the Railway Institute building.

Naturally, we used to shout across the street and invariably J and co. would hang out of the window of their sixth form common room and shout back. To say the nuns were unhappy is putting it a little mildly.

So, the rest is history - but not part of the exhibition...

I am convinced that there has never been a better opening and I feel fine. As much feedback as yer like ;)