Here are three lovely interviews with some of the people who came out to support the community arts project at Stirchley Baths recently.
Almost 300 hands were displayed around the Baths, each with a personal message of support for the project or an idea of how the heritage of the building can be shared with local people. You can see more on the event HERE.
All of the hands will be displayed in Stirchley Library soon, by the way, so you can have a look at the kind of things people were saying.
It was great to meet Emma Larkinson and Jayne Murray from Place Prospectors to hear all about a piece of artwork they’ve been commissioned to produce as part of the project to bring Stirchley Baths back into use as a community hub.
The first will be a piece of participatory art that will be started in June when the funding bid to the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) is submitted. It will be called (somewhat fittingly at this critical stage in the project) ‘Sink or Swim’ and will require lots of community participation, so we’ll keep you updated on the details for this so you can get involved.
The second piece of artwork will be housed inside the community hub and Emma and Jayne have a number of ideas that they’re working up. They talk about them in detail in the interview but some ideas include:
Signs made of glitterboard (a material that moves and ripples gently, giving an appearance of water) to direct people from the rear of the Baths to the entrance at the front
There is space in the entrance lobby for a welcome mat. In fact, an indentation in the floor shows clearly where the original would have been. Emma and Jayne are thinking of making a new welcome mat
Remember the ceremonial key that was used to open the Baths in 1911? A new one could be made to mark the re-opening of the building as a community hub
Emma and Jayne are looking to utilise the bore hole in the Baths. When it opened, the original plan was to well for water but, unfortunately, a source was never found
What do you think of Emma and Jayne’s ideas? You can get involved and pass on your thoughts and ideas by mailing stirchleybaths@gmail.com or connecting with us on Twitter and Facebook
Some of the ideas come from the history of the site long before the Baths were built. Research by Emma and Jayne has uncovered some fascinating details of what took place on the site, including:
1830: The Beer House Act led to the opening of many beer houses in an attempt to minimise the drinking of gin! The Black Horse beerhouse and stables opened on the site of Stirchkey Baths in this year
In the 1890s a wonderfully named Blood Tub Theatre was on the site, a tent theatre to present old melodramas
Last week I was given privileged access into the baths (I did have to plead a bit!) so I could really get a sense of the physical space within the building to help us shape our interpretative proposal for the Heritage Lottery Fund Activity plan. Architect Mark Sloane patiently answered my many questions about what historic features were being kept, restored, reused and accessible for the public – what bits people would actually be able to see.
I came away feeling decidedly grubby, but confident that the essence of the building will be maintained through the restoration – that Stirchley Baths will always be just that – but re-purposed.
I couldn’t resist making another movie – this time with some sound effects! For those of you never to have made it to an open day – here is what it looks like inside – not just in the pool, but also in the slipper baths, Mikvah, sauna, changing room, corridors, front entrance and in the original ticket kiosk. Very sad to see what has become of the building – but so important to show how vital this Heritage Lottery grant is!
Jenny Barnwell was taken to Stirchley Baths as a five-year-old by her parents as soon as they arrived back in Britain from a holiday in Spain.
Jenny had been paddling in the Costa del Sol sea when she was sucked into the ocean by a wave. Luckily, she was “spat back out again” but the terrifying experience made her parents enrol her for swimming lessons.
Jenny wrote this on her hand to support the Stirchley Baths community hub project: “I learned to swim here in 1960 after a close shave – I nearly drowned in the sea at Costa del Sol.”
Fiona Cullinan shared her memories of learning to swim at Stirchley Baths in the mid-70s at the recent Stirchley Community Market.
Fiona remembers people queuing round the block in the long hot summer of 1976 and the pressure from her friends to lose the armbands before swimming lessons began in earnest at school!
Fiona lived in London for 20 years but has returned to Stirchley and is more keen than ever to see the building restored and brought back into use.
Fiona talks about her swim passes in the interview and she’s very kindly sent us some photos of them. Thanks Fiona!
You can see more of Fiona’s Stirchley Baths photographs HERE by the way, including lots from the open day at the building in 2011
Do you have some memorabilia from Stirchley Baths that you can share with us? Drop us a line at stirchleybaths@gmail.com or connect with us on Twitter or Facebook. We’d love to hear from you!
