Dear Fellow Polished Corners,

I write from Cloud 9 where I still am after the wonderful day we had celebrating five Heads and Quondam’s 140th birthday on Saturday!

Even the unruliest of Polished Corners (are there any?) were perfectly behaved under the watchful eyes of not one but FIVE Heads!

We were delighted to welcome four former Presidents of Quondam/Heads of our beloved school — Pamela Parsonson, Gillian Low, Vivienne Chapman (formerly Durham) and Charles Fillingham — together with our current President and Head, Katharine Woodcock.

In all, 45 former students representing various years from 1958-2024, 20 former teachers and 5 current members of staff gathered for lunch in the Hall.  What a pleasure it was to see so many familiar and new faces and friendships renewed.

Before the festivities began, there was a particularly moving gathering in the Drama Studio, where memories of the late inspirational Head of English, Marianne Williamson, who taught at Francis Holland from 1992 to 2010, were shared and some of her favourite pieces recited. How thrilled she would have been to know that Drama now has a home of its own. Our warmest thanks to Graziella Cacace and Jeannine Addinall for organising this lovely tribute.

The AGM was well attended and, remarkably, completed a little earlier than its allotted time! I am particularly delighted to report two pieces of wonderful news.

A generous donation has made up the shortfall in our Quondam Sixth Form Scholarship Fund, enabling us to welcome our second Quondam Scholar in September 2027 with other donations going towards fundraising for the 2029 Scholar. The Committee are ever hopeful that there will always be a Quondam Scholar in the Sixth Form – there is no better way we can show gratitude and appreciation of our school and repay the chance it gave us of such a fine education than by sponsoring a pupil who otherwise could not benefit from all that our school offers – above and beyond an excellent education.

Thank you to bursary pupil Frances Baawuah who spoke at lunch on how much she appreciates having been given that chance. Now a successful and busy GP, a partner of two large inner-city London practices, and Clinical Director of Camden Community services and loving mother of two lucky children, she more than repays the school by being a Governor of the Trust. As she said, giving the price of one or a few coffees every month or even every year all adds up. Maybe one day we will have more than one QS in school at the same time.

We were also fortunate enough to recruit several new Committee volunteers from the 1990’s and this century, who will bring fresh energy and help us to represent a wider cross-section of our community. I am delighted to say one is a bursary student.

Also, we hopefully have a volunteer to become Quondam’s Treasurer – no one will appreciate this more than Benita who, despite resigning two years ago, is still serving as Acting Treasurer making her role as Treasurer span merely 50 years!!!! We hope she will stay on the Committee as a member though!

We lunched in our beautiful Hall, which looked stunning with tables of different sizes covered in white cloths and red napkins matching the red and white carnations scattered on the tables. The warmth and buzz in the room were palpable. A sumptuous buffet, beautifully prepared by Mark Palos and his catering team was served in the wonderfully bright new Library.

A highlight of the afternoon was hearing all five Heads speak one after each other. Pamela's wonderfully humorous, dry, down-to-earth observations, Gillian's tales of catastrophes and triumphs, Vivienne's accounts of successes and a narrowly averted disaster, and Charles's witty three Ps provided a fascinating glimpse into their years at the helm.

Katharine brought us right up to date with her inspirational plans to create more space in our small but ever-growing building. I very much hope that Polished Corners will support this exciting next chapter.

Such a day could not have happened without a great deal of hard work behind the scenes. Our heartfelt thanks go to all five Heads, to Xanthe Robertson, who so calmly and cheerfully brought everything together, to Tom Robertson for his unfailing generosity of time to the Committee, to Liz Rolfe Johnson for accompanying our School Hymn, and to Mark Palos and all the school staff who looked after us so splendidly.

A special thank you to Amelia Slocombe and my other fellow Committee members, whose dedication and enthusiasm make Quondam what it is.

And finally, a huge thank you to everyone who came. No party is ever a party without happy guests, and you all certainly made this one memorable.

To those who couldn't join us, we missed you and hope to welcome you to another Quondam occasion very soon.

The next Quondam events will include a Remote Reunion in January and a Sing Along at St Cyprians Church organised by Jeannine Addinall and Julia Strauss on Saturday February 6th. A save the date flyer is attached.

With warmest wishes,

Susanne Nedas