More Early 1980s Highwoods Photos

When I think of the Gilberd at Highwoods I still think of it as a new school. I remember it opening while I was at North Hill, so to me it will always be the 'New Gilberd'. 

The Gilberd School - Highwoods

Hard to believe the school opened its doors almost 43 years ago now! And below are some of the first intake of students pictured on the 5th September 1980. Everyone in the photo is in their 50s now but if you recognise yourself or can identify anyone else please do drop us a line at eddiesphotos@icloud.com and we'll be sure to update this page.

The following photos were all taken at Highwoods in the early 80s and they show a new school which was still partly a building site. We have featured photos from Highwoods on the site before (you'll find a selection here, here and here) and we also published images from the visit of Princess Alexandra in 1981. 

Some of the photos on this page have been seen before but they have all been freshly scanned from the original prints, so none have appeared in this quality. If you click on any of the photos you will be able to view a high quality image. 

The following black and white aerial shots from the early 80s and the photo of the plans are interesting to compare with the later colour images (further below) which show the development of the surrounding residential area.  

My thanks to the Colchester Gazette and James Mitchell at the Gilberd School for allowing me to make scans of the original prints held in their archive.