Show of hands for Stirchley Baths? Ooooh Yeh!

Great day at Stirchley Library and outside the baths today; collecting hands, community support and ideas about how we present ‘the heritage of the baths’ to people. Amazing turnout! We estimate we engaged with over 200 people – and a huge thanks to everyone who came along today – we doubled the amount of hands we have already collected! The official count is 282 hands!

Such evidence that local people want to see the building restored and brought back into use. I especially love the conversation I had with an 8 year old who told me they walked past the building everyday and felt cheated she didn’t know what was inside – hopefully you will soon!

A huge and massive thank you to the volunteers who helped us make this day a very special one, including from Stirchley Baths Community Stakeholders Group: Sue Jackson, Jess Allan and Brenda Thomas; and from Birmingham Conservation Trust: Julian Cleaver, Louise Deakin, Rachel Hoeshan and Jane Baker. A big thank you also to Mukesh, local Stirchley resident, who was passing by on his way back from The Coop at 9.30 and offered to help us put the washing line up! He stayed and helped out until lunchtime. Talk about community spirit!

After I have typed up all the comments on the hands, we will be putting them into Stirchley Library – so you will get a chance to see what people have said. Matthew, working for Podnosh, has also collected some great interviews for this site, so watch this space!

Final thank you for today is for the wonderful staff at Stirchley Library who were fabulous hosts (and sorry for all the glitter left on the carpet!)

Great day. A strong message for the Heritage Lottery Fund – this is a project worth supporting. The community certainly do!

April 2, 2013

Aspirations for the Baths from local clubs, diverse communities, families and future generations

Last week I was at Stirchley Community Centre on Tuesday and Thursday evenings and spoke to many of the parents who bring their children to Arabic lessons about the Stirchley Baths Project.

Mohammed spoke to me about swimming during his days at Dame Elizabeth Cadbury’s and his aspirations to enjoy the building again with his family. –

listen to ‘Mohammed remembers swimming with Dame Cadbury's’ on Audioboo

We gathered some great ideas from both parents and their children about the sorts of events that they might enjoy together; having fun and learning about the history of the Baths at the same time. These included quizzes and ‘spot the historic feature’ treasure hunts around the building. For the older generation, talks would be welcome, with Bengali interpretors on hand. Women only activities were also suggested as a way to involve the local Muslim community in the centre’s programming.

I also had a great chat with Margaret and Joe from Birmingham Karate Club who see the future move to the Baths as a great opportunity to recruit new members to the club and widen their audience further. They have been running the club from Stirchley Community Centre for 6-7 years. Here is a brief history of how the club has grown in the area, and the mix of excitement and apprehension they feel towards the transition from the Community Centre to the Baths.

listen to ‘Margaret and Joe from Birmingham Karate Club’ on Audioboo

April 2, 2013

Stirchley Community School lends me their School Council!

Last week I met with the School Council – made up of 8 very bright pupils from years 3-6 attending Stirchley Community School. We talked about the Baths, looked at photographs and they came up with a list of questions they would ask a history expert if they met one (luckily I knew most the answers!)

They would want to ask:

How many people visited the Baths?
Why did it close?
When it was built?
How many baths were there?
What happens if the floor boards broke if people were dancing on them?
Were Germans allowed to visit the Baths during WWII?

They all agreed that seeing the building in its current state is a waste of a building and they thought it was important to restore it. If they went on a school visit they would like to learn some old fashioned dances, be ‘history detectives’ around the building and see an old bath tub! What a great 15 minute session!

Thank you to headteacher Mr Clifford for arranging my meeting with the School Council. He is very keen that the school and the Baths work in partnership in the future – including the new school film club and radio station reporting on the Baths project during its restoration period.

April 2, 2013

Are you ready to put your hand up too?

Such a great afternoon and evening at Stirchley Community Market today – we gathered 75 hands which include ideas about history and heritage-related activity they would like to see at the Baths as part of a Heritage Lottery funded programme, statements of support for the funding application and some lovely memories.

A few local people below who have contributed their hands already!

This means, we now have enough hands to stretch thumb to finger around about a third of the Baths as we begin our community art challenge this Saturday. Phew!

If you are one of the lovely people we spoke to above – then thank you! If you haven’t had the chance to contribute a hand, idea, message of support – please pop along to our event at Stirchley Library on Saturday 10.30am-3pm as we try and create a community SHOW OF HANDS around Stirchley Baths – come and help us get enough hands to fill 60m of washing line!!

(I’m sure Stirchley Library staff won’t mind if you drop a hand off before the event if you can’t make it on Saturday!)

Right, best get on with some more laminating!!

April 2, 2013

Architect Mark Sloane on the plans for Stirchley Baths

Mark Sloane from Acivico drew up the plans for the community hub at Stirchley Baths following community consultation and involvement.

The plans (which were approved by Birmingham City Council’s planning committee in March) were a real challenge – how to preserve the building’s historical features while making sure the building is fit for its new purpose in the 21st century?

Mark talks about how the swimming pool – although boarded over for the main hall of the community hub – will still be a central feature, as will lots of other features. For example, the reception kiosk, where people would have paid to swim or to take a bath, will be maintained and restored.

As well as conserving the building’s heritage, Mark says the plans also incorporate elements from the original plan for the Baths that were drawn up in the 1900s. A second cupola, much taller than the one that stands at the entrance to the building, was lost at some point in the building’s history, as was a clock. Both will be recreated as part of the community hub project. And both would never have been discovered if it wasn’t for the original, century-old plans (which we hope to get on to the site for you to have a look at very soon).

You can listen to the interview

listen to ‘Architect Mark Sloane on the plans for Stirchley Baths’ on Audioboo

We talked about the new plans for the community centre while looking at hard copies, with Mark giving a guided tour of sorts of what’s planned! Here are the plans we looked at:

Stirchley Baths Site Plan

Stirchley Baths Ground Plan

You can also download them as PDFs

Proposed Ground Floor Plan (PDF)
Proposed Site Plan (PDF)