The Project

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The project was established for the redevelopment of the Wolverley Memorial Hall and Sports & Social Club site in Wolverley, Worcestershire, and is a registered charity as part of Wolverley Memorial Hall.
The project was started in 2014. The centenary of the start of The Great War, seemed a fitting time to start the creation of a new memorial facility for future generations. The vision of the project is to create a new facility to serve the needs of the local community and beyond. Learning from the past and current uses of the site, together with understanding the changing needs of a modern community, our aim is to create a facility that is available to all people within Wolverley village and the surrounding area, is self-funding and environmentally sound.

This is a big task, but we are a strong and enthusiastic project team, drawn from the community, with many experiences and skills to offer this project. We are working with all the local groups who use the site and facilities, including  the Sports & Social club and Bowls Club, the Royal British Legion, the Women’s Institute, Scouts, Brownies, Wolverley Village Players and many other local interest groups and the Parish Council. We believe that working together we can be confident of an exciting legacy for Wolverley.

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The Proposed Design

An ambitious project to replace both Memorial Hall and Social Club, with a new purpose built facility. Each building had been built in the early 60’s in remembrance of Wolverley’s fallen from both World Wars. Despite the outstanding work of the respective committees, the buildings had fallen into disrepair and, following a survey, it was deemed that the existing facilities were beyond economic repair. We set about consultation with all interested parties and began the long task of raising funds to meet the initial cost of our proposal. The community has supported us in this task, attending events such as Beer festivals, Barn Dances, Dog shows and Craft Fayres, to name a few.

The money we have raised  has been used not only to fund these events but to pay for the surveys required and provide incentives to get local architecture practices to enter a competition to design the new facility. This competition was voted on by the local residents and was won by Jennings, Homer & Lynch Ltd. This practice produced an ambitious three storey scheme with a distinctive round tower. Following on from this initial proposal, they have now refined their drawing to take into account our budget while meeting the accommodation requirements we requested. Whilst we have not been able to meet some of the more extravagant request: swimming pool, full length indoor bowling and rifle range, we believe the architects have come up with a design that best suits our requirements for now and into the future.

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The new facility will be built over two levels and will be built where the current Social Club stands extending out towards the area of the playground. It will have two main function halls, one being single storey, the other a two storey space allowing such sports as badminton/basketball along with other activities like live entertainment and amateur dramatics, the other venue will be more for parties and wedding receptions although both will be completely interchangeable and will be available to hire for all types of sporting/fitness and entertainment events. In addition, we will have a bar/cafe area on both levels, the upper level being the member’s bar. There will be ample storage and smaller meeting rooms with designated rooms for Scouts, Tennis and Bowls club. The facility will be totally disabled friendly with access throughout utilising both lifts and sloped pathways.

 

It is proposed that the new facility would be managed by a single committee with all money raised going to the maintenance of the facility and financing activities for the betterment of the whole community. In addition, because of the facilities layout, we will be able to have multiple functions occurring at the same time without hindrance to each other.

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We believe that this scheme meets the requirements of the majority of the community and although we accept it will not be to the taste of everyone and some will feel it falls short of their personal requirements, it is this best that we could possibly hope for within our budget. It is a credit to the architects who have patiently revised and re-revised drawings and, is a facility that the community should be proud to own, providing a lasting memorial and legacy to our fallen.