Cumbria

Great Corby Village Hall

A comfortable space for intergenerational events

Helen Dodd became the chair of Great Corby Village Hall in 2017. Following the Greening Report in November 2021, the Trustees decided to develop a plan of action to reduce the hall's carbon footprint. The hall sought funding through the Community Spaces Partnership to better insulate, heat and double glaze the building. Together, they applied for funding in stages to:

  • Fix the roof
  • Arrange for new windows from a local business to improve damp and condensation
  • Have solar panels installed, with inverters and batteries ready to be connected
  • Upgrade the heating system
  • Install LED lighting
GCVH Solar Pv (Landscape) 1

Helen Dodd, Chair of Great Corby Village Hall, explains more: 

Making connections

The Community Spaces Partnership brings people, places, services and funding together. In Great Corby, upgrading the heating and windows has led to:

  • Immediate, positive feedback that the hall is warmer and brighter
  • Improved attendance at events like coffee mornings and craft markets
  • Coffee mornings now often include visits from pupils at the local primary school, bring generations together
  • More capacity to host larger events like film and slide-show nights, with 65-80 attendees

Community impacts

Improvements to the space through the Community Spaces Partnership funding have benefitted the local community:

  • Offering Warm Hub events so that people can come to the hall instead of putting their heating on at home
  • Intergenerational events like school visits help younger and older people to get to know each other and build lasting friendships
  • The hall houses a space for yoga classes and hairdressing upstairs
  • They can look at hosting youth clubs in the space so that families do not need to travel to nearby towns

Future plans

​The trustees at Great Corby Village Hall plan to continue improving their hall's sustainability, in part because it has the added benefit of making the space less expensive to run. This includes progressing with the solar panel battery installation.

There is also an aim to improve storage at the hall, by moving the kitchen to another room, and repurposing an outbuilding to store chairs. Once the structural improvements are complete, the trustees plan to decorate the space. 

 

Helen said:

"​We hope it’s going to have an impact on the bills, but of course it’s too soon to know [...] and we are constantly working on things to make it a more usable and pleasant space."

How ACTion with Communities in Cumbria helped

​ACTion with Communities in Cumbria (ACT) helped to prepare the hall for funding by advising on forms, policies, governance and compliance. ACT assisted the trustees at Great Corby Village hall to access training and administered funding.

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