Selsey Pavilion is to be restored to former glories and refurbished as a multi-purpose arts and heritage centre – thanks to a major new grant from The National Lottery Heritage Fund.
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00:00 Good morning, my name is Phil Hewitt, Group Arts Editor for Sussex Newspapers, and always
00:06 lovely to speak to Christian Skouten, but particularly today because Christian, Chairman
00:10 of the Selsey Pavilion Trust, you have the most fabulous news, don't you, in terms of
00:16 grants. What's happened?
00:18 We do. So, yeah, we've literally just heard that in the same month that the Selsey Pavilion
00:25 is 110 years old, we've been awarded a major grant of nearly £250,000 by the National
00:34 Lottery Heritage Fund. So that kind of closes out all of the fundraising that we've been
00:40 doing over the last year.
00:41 And that's towards the acquisition, so the purchase of the building.
00:45 It's for the purchase of the building and some very, very early sort of essential repairs
00:51 for fixing the roof and that sort of thing.
00:53 And that's incredibly exciting, isn't it? Because it's worth stressing that this has
00:57 been an incredibly long journey, hasn't it? Sort of six years in the planning, you've
01:01 been chairman for three of them.
01:04 Yeah.
01:05 And it's clearly now definitely, without a doubt, going to happen, isn't it?
01:09 Yeah, exactly. It's been a long road. And I think I should say before the charity was
01:14 set up, I mean, there's been an awful lot of people in the community that have been
01:17 trying to get this project going for decades. I mean, really going back to the 80s, there
01:25 were people talking about it. So I think it's fantastic. And I think even looking back three
01:32 years ago, to sort of where we were then to now, it's unbelievable really.
01:37 And the point is what it's going to be, which will be a community arts and heritage centre,
01:43 which will really do great things for the town of Tillsey, won't it?
01:47 It is. Over the period of the last few years, we've been sort of really refining what the
01:53 project will be. And I think it's definitely going to be a multi-purpose space. It's going
01:58 to be this community arts and heritage centre, it'll be a theatre, cinema. We also said we've
02:05 been funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, and heritage is going to be a big part
02:10 of it. So we really want to try and be able to dedicate space to local heritage, to tell
02:15 the story of Selsey and the wider peninsula.
02:18 And that heritage aspect has become more important as the project has gone on then.
02:22 Yeah, definitely. I think it's always been something we've wanted to do. But I think
02:29 we're starting to look down the line at sort of phase two and the grand restoration that
02:34 will be three, four years in the future, obviously funding dependent. But looking at that, we've
02:41 started realising that hopefully there's spaces that we can dedicate to heritage.
02:44 Yeah, and it's tempting to think of this project as giving Selsey this fantastic new multi-purpose
02:50 centre. But in a way, it's simply giving Selsey back what it once had, isn't it?
02:55 Exactly. As I said, it opened 110 years ago. And it ran from the very early days, it was
03:03 a multi-purpose space. There was everything from boxing to sort of fundraising events
03:09 for the RNLI. It really had everything. And it was showing silent film from the very early
03:17 days. And it really went through in different guises till the 1970s.
03:26 It shut to the public and it became a packing facility for a company called WK Thomas. But
03:32 even that, it was an employer until 2008 when they left the building. So it's kind of always
03:38 had this, it's been in the centre of the high street in Selsey. And it's always played a
03:44 really important role. But it's very underutilised. And it's kind of always often talked about
03:51 as the long forgotten theatre in Selsey.
03:54 But in its heyday, it had some pretty significant people though, didn't it?
03:59 Exactly. We've literally, there was always a rumour about the Russian ballet appearing
04:03 there. And in the last three months, my colleague Keith Batchelor has finally uncovered proof
04:11 that Nijinsky, well Nijinska was there, the sister of Nijinsky, with a very small sort
04:20 of taste or flavour of the Russian ballet. But we've got concrete evidence. And also
04:27 all sorts of other people in the 20s and 30s. And even, you know, Second World War, Hollywood,
04:35 there was a Hollywood actress, can't remember the name now, but we'll do a newsletter about
04:40 her soon, who turned up to highlight the plight of the prisoners of war. And there's all sorts
04:45 of little bits and pieces we're uncovering all the time.
04:48 Which is why, as we're saying, that heritage aspect is going to be very important.
04:52 Yeah, I think it's lovely that we're finally being able to sort of put together the whole
04:57 story.
04:58 So purchase by latest March, ideally by the end of this year, and potentially then cinema,
05:05 some acts in the next summer, 2024.
05:07 Yeah, that'd be amazing. I mean, that's the dream. That's what we want to do.
05:13 We've grimped all the way and it's come true.
05:17 We've appointed solicitors now. So, you know, it really just depends how long this purchase
05:23 process takes. But if we can, you know, I'm really, really hopeful we can get there by
05:27 the end of the year. And then that will put us in good stead to sort of carry out some
05:32 of the urgent repairs early next year and be able to open sometime in the summer.
05:36 You know, stage one is going to be, it's going to remain unheated and it is going to be something
05:41 we can only use the main hall really in the summer and sort of late spring seasons. But
05:46 it will give us, you know, the ability to get the public in the community and showcase
05:51 what we're planning to do down the road.
05:52 Fantastic. Well, keep me posted at every stage. Let's keep chatting. But in the meantime,
05:57 huge congratulations. It's a massive achievement to have had this vision and to have brought
06:02 it to this point. So well done. And thank you.
06:05 Thanks. Cheers.
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