IPSWICH'S DanceHouse project has received its largest personal donation to date with a contribution of £100,000 from a Suffolk couple.

IPSWICH'S DanceHouse project has received its largest personal donation to date with a contribution of £100,000 from a Suffolk couple.

Martyn and Pippa Rose, from Debenham, have donated the money in memory of a friendship between renowned choreographer Sir Frederick Ashton and Marty'n Rose's late mother Margaret.

To mark the donation one of the four studio's in the DanceEast centre, which will be built at Ipswich Waterfront, will be named the Sir Frederick Ashton Studio.

Sir Frederick and Margaret met through mutual friends and danced together at numerous New Year's Eve parties held by the friends.

The parties were the highlight of Margaret's year and today her son, who went to school in Ipswich, said dancing was her passion.

Assis Carreiro, Director of DanceEast said: “This donation is made in the spirit of the great pleasure that dance can bring and it brings that experience closer for many more people.

“Sir Fred loved Suffolk and was inspired by its landscape and it is fitting that as he lived in Eye and is buried in Yaxley, that he be remembered in the DanceHouse. We thank the Roses for their great generosity.”

The £7.9million DanceEast DanceHouse will open in Autumn 2008.