Councillor Lorna Campbell attended the quarterly meeting of the Kennington, Oval, and Vauxhall Forum on Tuesday.
The meeting was updated on the 'Future Kennington' programme - the Council's project to transform two sites in Prince's ward into new community facilities.
At the site of the old Lilian Baylis school, Lambeth Council, who owns the site, are working with the Sport Action Zone, Ethelred Nursery School and Children’s Centre and the All Nations Centre (ANC) to expand the sports and young persons focused services already operating from the site and to bring together on the site a range of community facilities. The overarching aim of the partnership is to create a community hub that is inter-generational and inclusive with activities based around sports, health, arts and culture, economic activity, community activities, education, childcare and the environment.
Complex negotiations are currently underway, by the partners ae hopeful that a decision by the Council on transferring the ownership of the land will be taken this March. Within the next week a project update will be circulated to all local households.
Across Black Prince Road at the Beaufoy Institute (pictured), work continues to develop the Studio School and Museum and Workshop proposal.
In September 2008 Lambeth and the Young Foundation jointly submitted a detailed proposal for a Studio School on the vacant part of the site. The proposal was developed with a wider consortium of partners, including the, the De Morgan Centre, Lady Margaret Hall Settlement and Kate Hoey MP.
The aim of the Lambeth Studio School is to provide a small-scale environment for some 300 students which will, in close partnership with local businesses, target a cohort of learners and nurture within them skills of enterprise and entrepreneurship. A potential lead business partner, Arora International Hotels, has been identified. A government decision as to whether the proposal should continue to be developed is expected by the end of January 2009.
The school proposal sits within a shared vision for the wide site to create an Arts and Crafts Museum, operated by the De Morgan Foundation, which will itself be a major educational resource, as well as associated Arts and Crafts artisans’ workshops offering a range of employment and apprenticeship opportunities.
Currently, the Council, working closely with the De Morgan Foundation, is undertaking detailed spatial feasibility work around the constraints of the site and buildings and looking at how the Museum and workshops might coexist with the proposed school. Work is also ongoing to seek to align the De Morgan proposal with the objects of the Beaufoy Charitable Trust, who own the historically and architecturally more significant 1905 part of the Beaufoy Institute building. This work to explore the viability of the project enables the De Morgan Foundation themselves to further develop the overall project business plan and necessary funding streams.
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