Creative Torbay / News / Wed 22 Jul 2015
Some rather exciting news from The Bike Shed Theatre
Some rather exciting news from The Bike Shed Theatre ...
We’re thrilled to announce our plans for a new creative space on Exeter’s quay. Two years ago, we were invited to look around the Maclaines warehouses, which were most recently used as the Maritime Museum. Since then, we’ve worked with experts including the Stirling Prize-winning architects Haworth Tompkins, to create feasibility studies into how the buildings could be used.
On the 6th July, we presented our plans to Exeter Canal and Quay Trust (who own the building and who kindly gave us funding to conduct the feasibility). We can now reveal our plans:
1. On the ground floor there'll be a bar, cafe and bakery, open from morning to midnight. There’ll also be an indoor market for craft, design, food and drink.
2. On the first floor, there'll be a 250-seat theatre, a smaller room for comedy and live music and desk and studio space for creative companies.
3. On the second floor, there'll be rehearsal rooms, both for professional work and for educational activities.
So how are you going to do that then?
Clearly we need to raise some money to make this happen. Whilst we're doing this we're keen to hear as wide a range of ideas for how the space could be used. Our ideas are only the starting point and they're all up for grabs. We also hope to have access to the site from an early stage so that we can host events there in its current state, gently breathing it into life and inviting people into the process of reviving it, testing the building to see what works best.
What does that mean for the current Bike Shed on Fore Street?
There are no plans to leave our Fore Street home when the new theatre opens. The opportunity of having both spaces will allow us to be more flexible and we envisage being able to make even more of the unique oddities of our original theatre.
How can I get involved?
Normally at the start of a capital project, you’d be asked for money. But at this stage we’d rather have your ideas. So if there’s anything you’d like to see in the space – however boring or outrageous – please get in touch. Our Director and Co-Founder David Lockwood is keen to hear from you. You can reach him on davidlockwood@bikeshedtheatre.co.uk.