Henshaws Arts and Crafts is planning to reopen in October 2020.
The centre closed in June 2020, but with the intention of reopening.
There have been regular meetings between the charity and authorities, in North Yorkshire and Leeds.
Gemma Young, Henshaws, said:
We have 175 art makers, but initially we won’t be able to open with a full capacity – we do want to offer everyone something though.
It will have to be different though as we are having to change the rooms around and will need to clean in between groups.
The Ethos of the centre hasn’t changed though.
There is a really strong positive feeling and people have missed having it – that’s come from the community, carers, families and art makers.
At the moment there is lots going on behind the scenes, getting the centre and the staff ready.
As an organisation they are looking much more at the financial side of many of their events, as an additional way to support.
Many of their events, such as The Beach, offer incredibly good value to the visitor. They haven’t always charged entry for events, but there needs to be a shift to more of a commercial focus, but keeping the events accesible.
Gemma Young said:
Since lockdown we have lost a lot of our fundraising capability as we haven’t been able to host many of the events we would have normally.
We are around £150K down on fundraising.
Henshaws still needs the support of the public and we are running Henshaws hundreds.
We are asking people to cycle 100 miles, do 100 laps of a garden, walk 100 miles or do 100 of something else, between 21 and 30 September.
We already have a growing group of people that are supporting the Henshaws Hundreds, but we would like even more!
For further details on Henshaws Hundreds see https://www.henshawshundreds.org.uk/
360 video (don’t forget you can scroll around)
