Greenfields celebrated our second birthday last week, with the grand opening of our new headquarters, Greenfields House. The brand new building is along Charter Way at Freeport Village, Braintree.

Over 100 people turned up for the opening, including staff, residents, architects, board members - and special ribbon-cutting guests, Emily Overall and Rosie Daines.

Emily is believed to be Greenfields’ longest serving tenant (with the council and then Greenfields since 1938), and the very sprightly Rosie Daines is a Greenfields’ tenant who turned 100 earlier last month. Emily said of the day: “I would like to thank all concerned, it is such an honour; it’s been lovely.”

Greenfields revealed their permanent works of art, which were inspired by Greenfields’ residents and staff. They include a five metre high wall of over 800 door knobs, each depicting a detail from the personal mementoes and lives of members of the community.  Examples of the images on the door knobs included a 20-week scan of a baby, a silver Jubilee mug, a clothing ration book from 1947 and a photo of five generations of a family.

Sarah Sabin, the local artist who created and developed the artworks, said: “This community art project was about looking below the surface of a place to find out about the people, communities, and the stories behind them. It was nice to get feedback today and to see what people were interested in finding out about it.”

There are 120 Greenfields’ staff members based in the building (there are also offices in Witham and Halstead). It has several environmentally-friendly features, such as natural ventilation, underground heat pumps and rainwater harvesting for reuse in the building.

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