Over eight years of determined fund-raising and perseverance is coming to fruition for the villagers of Shilbottle in Northumberland as the first ground was cut today in preparation for regional construction company Stephen Easten Building, part of Esh Group, to begin work to begin on constructing their new community hall.

William Symmonds, (9) won the opportunity of the cutting the first ‘sod’ in a poetry competition organised by the fundraising committee together with Shilbottle First School.  William, now at Lindisfarne Middle School was accompanied by joint runners up Matthew Wilkinson (9) and Erin Hickman (9).

To be known as the Shilbottle Community Hall, the 500+ sq m timber frame building will be clad in locally-sourced cedar and larch timber.  An array of environmentally friendly technologies for heat and energy generation, such as wind turbine and ground source heat pumps, and economical use of resources, such as rain water harvesting and natural light and ventilation, have been incorporated.

The building overlooks the cricket pitch and sports field and the facilities have been designed to provide maximum versatility – to include a main hall, multi-use rooms, kitchen and Sports England approved standard changing rooms.

Peter Brown, Chair of The Shilbottle Community Hall fundraising committee said:
“This is an important and very happy day for the residents of Shilbottle.  We have persevered for a long time to achieve this important asset for our community.  We’ve attracted funding from many, many sources and worked hard to collect funds from the local community too.

“We are delighted with the design of the building – which has been well received by Alnwick District Council and villagers alike - we are all really looking forward to seeing the contractors start work in early October.”

Mrs Angela Jeffries, Head Teacher at Shilbottle First School continued:
“We have missed the old community hall so much since the fire and we just can’t wait to have this marvellous new building.  This is a major development for our village; we are planning to follow the construction work carefully and use it as a topic for many of our lessons.

“The children are really excited – which is great as they will have the use and be stewards of this building for, hopefully, very many years to come.”

Peter Lowe of architects, Purves Ash LLP, describes the new hall as ‘traditional in appearance, with a dash of modernity’ and believes that without the energy and commitment of the client this building could never be realised.  Stephen Easten Limited will begin construction on 12th October; the work is expected to take 33 weeks. 

Stephen Conn, Operations Director at Stephen Easten Limited explained:
“We are looking forward to starting work on this project and to liaising with a wide range of people in the village who have a real interest in the new hall.  It is clear that this building is very important to the local community and that they have overcome many set backs to get this far.  It is good to know that we will be helping them to achieve their goal.”

Funding for the scheme has been received from, Big Lottery Community Buildings Fund £21,000 + £413,922; Football Foundation £100,000, Alnwick District Council £200,000; European Rural Development Fund Leader Programme £52,000; smaller charities £20,000; community donations £10,500, Parish Council £10,000