Can we reopen Hornsey Baths to the Public?

Posted on behalf of Bethany Wells

INVITATION

Informal meeting over a drink in the 3 Compasses, 7pm, Saturday 24th September 2011

A couple of months ago I made some posters suggesting that we might find a way to open up Hornsey Public Baths to everyone in Haringey as a community design centre, www.fairgroundcollective.net. By the railway bridge, could it help bridge the West and East of the borough, a space to visit to be surrounded by challenges, practical ideas and skills for local resilience?

I will be back at the end of September and would like to see if anyone else in interested in adding ideas for this space, and coming up with a plan to take it to the council/developers more seriously.  See below for the ideas so far!
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IDEAS SO FAR:

• Design, sustainability, resource centre
• Studios and workshops available at cost price to hire for an hour (or a year) for artists, technicians, e.g. bike repair, consulting rooms, designers, music lessons
• Meeting space, music, educational and film space
• Non-profit locally sourced vegetarian catering for events
• A growing space - sister to FFTS project
• Linking with local schools, youth groups, residents
• Keep the character, raw, hints of its past uses, bare industrial surfaces contrasting with neat, new, low budget timber insertions
• Make it watertight, and add heated, insulated, small hireable studio spaces, with an open central event/reception space
• Refurbishment in a low energy, step-by-step way, with a blog and exhibition showing the processes
• Rainwater collection, reclaimed wool insulation, linking with the recycle depot to supply materials
• Workshops and volunteer sessions at all stages of refurbishment, providing opportunity to learn skills in making, and about an ecological approach to space
• Using reclaimed materials, a case study in permaculture retrofititting of existing buildings
• Research and test economic models for a community resource and education space 
• Set up Fairground Collective as a social enterprise
• Run as a co-operative or social enterprise business model