What is a Community Arts Centre?

In most villages, towns and cities, groups meet to pursue their artistic interests. In the village there is quite likely to be a an acting group and possibly an art group. Towns will often add to that with groups interested in photography, dancing, singing and playing music, writing and other groups attending artistic events rather than participating in them. In cities these groups can often be multiplied several times, as well as giving opportunities for very special interests such as international folk dancing, matchstick model making and ceramic doll painting. Of course on top of this there are usually hundreds, if not thousands of individuals pursuing their own artistic interests, such as painting undertaken as a solitary pursuit, and concert and theatre going.

Most groups are extremely enterprising in finding accommodation for their pursuits, although many will admit that some of the places in which they meet are not entirely suited to their artistic endeavours.

Some towns do develop arts centres, based very often on the fortuitous availability of a building first built for some other purpose, such as the Brewery Arts Centre at Kendal. The facilities that such centres offer are mostly confined to the amount and type of space that each particular building allows. What however, such a centre does do, is to encourage more people to participate in artistic activities, as it becomes a focal point for those members of the community who wish to fulfil themselves artistically in one way or another.

The Fortuitous Opportunity in Lytham St. Annes for a Community Arts Centre

Lytham St. Annes has such a window of opportunity at the beginning of the New Millennium with the designation of the old part of the College building in Clifton Drive South as a Grade II Listed Building, at the same time as it has been placed on the market for sale.

The Edwardian part of the College would provide an ideal venue for many of the existing arts groups in the town, and with space available, could be responsible for stimulating the growth of arts groups yet to be formed. Ideally, the Centre could be a hive of artistic activity, not only in the evening, but also during the day and at weekends too. Furthermore, it is situated next to the St. Annes Public Library, itself a Listed Building, which creates the opportunity for the development of a cultural corner in a town not over endowed with artistic and cultural provision. It could also provide an extra tourist attraction, which will be elaborated further below.

The Building - The Vision

The Old College Building is on three floors; a semi-basement, the 'ground' floor up a short flight of steps, and a top floor, and the first equipment to be installed would be a lift capable of taking wheelchairs.

A. The 'Ground Floor'

Starting in the middle, the main entrance hall is quite an impressive concourse with rooms off to left and right that lend themselves to public casual use.

The suggestions for use are as follows:

1. To the right of the main entrance it is hoped that the Lancashire County Library will expand its provision to include a larger reference library and a 'Cyber Cafe' with good quality catering, and with seating that could spill out into the concourse in 'pavement cafe style'.
2. To the left an Art Gallery could be created to house the works of art left to the Borough of Fylde by the late Alderman Dawson, and which have remained in storage since their gift several decades ago. There are sufficient pictures in the collection to present at least two separate exhibitions each year, say each of  two months duration, and the remainder of the time the exhibition area could take travelling exhibitions often sponsored by the Arts Council, and/or provide space for commercial exhibitions. Timetabled well this could become part of the attractions for the more discerning tourist.
3. The entrance to the Gallery would be at the far end, away from the main entrance, walking through towards the front, where in the front corner there would be a small bookshop specialising in arts books and any other materials pertaining to any of the current exhibitions. It could also of course provide books covering the wide variety of artistic activities taking place in the Community Arts Centre. A bookshop owner in St. Annes has already expressed interest in such a provision.
4. This floor therefore would be the main public area with people coming and going, and possibly providing a cross-section of the public with a meeting place in the cafe.

B. The Top Floor

1. In this space there is a large meeting room capable of holding about 100 people, together with five smaller rooms for group meetings or rehearsals. One of the smaller rooms may be given up for storage so that the remaining spaces can be used as flexibly as possible.
2. It is intended to let these rooms to education and arts groups for their meetings and to  encourage the use of the large room for studio theatre productions by local and national companies, recitals, poetry readings and large public lectures of any kind.
3. The studio theatre would therefore need to be well equipped with good lighting and some of the adjacent rooms would provide excellent changing and green room facilities. This space would be ideal for groups wishing to paint and draw nude models as the lighting is excellent, it is not overlooked and appropriate changing facilities are at hand.
4. The Workers Educational Association and the University of Lancaster Extra-mural Department, have already agreed to use some of these rooms for classes during term times, should they be made available.
5. A further use more related to tourism could be developed with theme week-ends, especially during the winter, in conjunction with local hotels. Tutors would have to be of a national standing, and their expertise would be of benefit to local people as well as those coming into the town. Subjects might include aspects of theatre production, painting, sculpting, photography, dancing and music (especially in conjunction with the school opposite ), writing, calligraphy, flower arranging, yoga, for instance.
6. It is also suggested that one of the rooms on this floor might include a bar for use of Centre Members, and members of the public when performances take place, otherwise the bar facility might be included as part of the cafe on the ground floor.

C. The Lower Ground Floor

Part of this area is taken up by the boiler room, but it still leaves several spaces for use. It is envisaged that this area could be used by individuals or groups looking for more permanent long term space for more continuous activities. Ideally it could provide long term workshop or studio space for young artists in such fields as pottery, jewellery making and sculpting, with a commercial outlet above that they could use from time to time. Voluntary groups looking for space on a long term basis could well find the facility very useful, as could young entrepreneurs looking for work space to start up as printers or for internet businesses. It is also understood that some firms such as solicitors are looking for good storage for their collections of documents, and this area could well be utilised for that purpose.

D. Summary

In brief therefore, it is envisaged that

1. the lower ground floor would be used for long term lets for activities that are sympathetic to the use of the building as a whole.
2. the ground floor would be the main public area for casual use such as the library facilities, cafe, gallery and bookshop.
3. the upper floor would be the main area for a wide range of arts and education activities, from the private meetings of specific groups, to public performances in the studio theatre which would attract tourists as well as local people.

David Selby - 8/03/00