September 2008
Directors, Nigel Bellamy and Steve Oakford take Centre Stage alongside Julie Walters
Recently, we completed a refurbishment for the Actors Centre and 8build Directors Steve and Nigel joined patron Julie Walters at the Actors Centres 30th Birthday Party. The celebration was the ideal occasion to show off the Actors Centre’s new look to many friends from the acting industry. A raffle ran throughout the evening, raising £1800 for their 30th birthday appeal.
The centre was formed as a result of a discussion between Clive Swift, Sheila Hancock, actor and director John Alderton and director William Hobbs in 1978. They decided that there was a need for a place for actors to connect with each other informally, as well as having somewhere to learn new skills and refresh old ones. Today the centre runs 1700 classes and has a membership of 2000.
As a charitable organisation, keeping project costs down was a priority. Our main tasks were improving the disabled access and making the summer months comfortable by installing air-conditioning throughout the building. In a number of instances, elements of the project did not proceed as funds were not available to carry them out. Therefore, we (8build) along with architects TTSP and Quantity Surveyors the Philip Pank Partnership decided to go one step further and organised a working party to complete a days worth of work to these area’s outside the clients original brief.