By REBECCA DIXON

Published at 10:38, Thursday, 31 December 2009

ALLENDALE artists received a £300,000 gift this Christmas – in the shape of a cash award from the Rural Development Programme for England.

The money is the last piece in the financial jigsaw for the village’s new £600,000 art and media centre, meaning work can now get under way on the project.

The centre, the brainchild of members of Pebbles art gallery in the village, will be built on the site of the former Allendale Motor Co, just off the market place.

It will house an art and media centre for local artists and art groups, as well as provide exhibition space, a community café and a meeting place for youth groups, such as the Pebbles Myloop project.

The new building has been designed by local architect Kevin Doonan, and work is expected to start on Monday.

The development will be carried out by Bishop Auckland-based contractors VEST Construction Ltd, and is expected to take 12 months to complete.

The development is the result of three years hard work by members of the Allendale Creative Artists Community Interest Company (CIC) at Pebbles and the community.

Project leader and owner of Pebbles Amanda Galbraith said: “This has been a long process of funding applications, drawing up plans, talks with the community and fund-raising drives.

“It is wonderful news that this latest grant has come through, meaning we can finally get started with building our new centre.”

Cash for the project has come from Social Enterprise Northumberland, MIDAS, which supports economic studies, Adventure Capital and a £25,000 grant from the Leader programme.

Further fund-raising is also planned in a bid to minimise the amount of money CIC will have to borrow to complete the project.

Amanda said: “We want the centre to be somewhere where up and coming artists can share their ideas and experience and learn more about sustainability.

“We hope that it will create business opportunities, education, tourism and several jobs, both at the centre and within the supported businesses.

“We are so excited to finally get the project off the ground and we feel the centre will be of benefit to the whole community, not just local artists, once it is finished.”

Once the centre is complete it is hoped to mount an exhibition chronicling the history of the site.

Published by http://www.hexhamcourant.co.uk