£1m Big Lottery boost for Grangetown community

A community building will benefit from a grant of more than £1m following a successful bid to the Big Lottery Fund.

Grange Pavilion, a joint partnership between Cardiff University’s Community Gateway, Grange Pavilion Project, and Grangetown Community Action, has received £1,072,692 to refurbish and extend the current building in Grange Gardens.

The result will be a multi-functional community facility that will provide opportunities for education, training, health promotion and enterprise development, with a café, office and meeting spaces.

There are also plans to improve the existing grounds to create an accessible green space and an orchard and pollinator garden.

Lynne Thomas, Project Manager for Community Gateway, one of Cardiff University’s flagship engagement projects, said: “We are delighted to have received this grant, which is the culmination of much hard work from everyone involved. The funding will be used to further develop Grange Pavilion into a high quality, dynamic venue that can be used by people of all ages.

“The plans for the pavilion have been developed with IBI Group and Dan Benham Architect, following five years of consultations by students at the Welsh School of Architecture in collaboration with community members. It will transform the building into a thriving centre that will benefit the people of Grangetown for many years to come. Hundreds of people have helped us get to this exciting point and we are thrilled to be able to move forward with our plans thanks to this grant.”

Grange Pavilion is a partnership project between Cardiff University and residents’ groups Grange Pavilion Project (GPP), Grangetown Community Action (GCA), Grange Pavilion CIO and Cardiff Council and is supported by a number of other partners, including Garfield Weston Foundation, Cardiff Bay Rotary Club, IKEA, ASDA, Cardiff Council Neighbourhood Partnerships Fund, and Cardiff and Vale College.

Cardiff University’s Vice-Chancellor, Professor Colin Riordan said: “We at Cardiff University are immensely proud of our partnership with the Grange Pavilion Project. It is an excellent example of our continuing ambition to work with our local community, helping to promote social cohesion and improve levels of health, wealth and well-being. Cardiff University relies on support from charitable funders for projects such as the Grange Pavilion. We would like to thank the Big Lottery Fund for this transformative grant, which will enable us to turn our vision for the building into a reality.”

Grange Pavilion is one of five projects receiving a total of £5.4million of National Lottery money from the Big Lottery Fund’s Community Asset

Transfer 2 programme to transform disused spaces into local landmarks and community hubs.

The aim of the initiative is to help make Grangetown an even better place through developing world-class research, teaching and volunteering opportunities that are co-produced between the community and University for mutual benefit.

Since 2013, more than 150 undergraduate architecture students, as well as students studying business and architecture masters, have worked with Community Gateway to develop ideas for the building as part of their research and learning.