Peasedown St John’s Hive Community Centre is holding an Open Day on Saturday, 13th November from 10 am – 4 pm, and members of the community are invited to attend.

The Hive Community Centre opened last year, run by a team of volunteers, and was formerly the youth centre in Peasedown for many decades. Following B&NES Council’s initial intention to close the building, the community stepped in with a vision to create a community space with a range of services and activities for local people.

Centre Manager, Lucy Day, said: “Our open day will be the first real opportunity the community has had to see the building after the first phase of refurbishment and to discover what goes on inside.

“The Hive Community Centre has rooms available for hire including three meeting rooms, a large art room, a sports hall large enough for badminton, and an outside sport’s court. It is an ideal venue for children’s parties.

“During the open day visitors can check out the village post office, enjoy some tasty refreshments from the SWALLOW Café, and browse over 700 books in the community library. We’ll also have a craft fayre taking place in the sports hall organised by local glass artist, Tracey Quinn.”

The grand opening of the new children’s indoor play area will be taking place at 11 am. Costing around £12,000 to build, funding was received from the National Lottery, Quartet Community Foundation, the Parish Council and Cllr Karen Walker’s Empowerment Fund.

Chair of the Hive’s Management Committee, Joy Fraser, added: “Our Open Day will be an opportunity for us to thank the community for all their support over the last two years, from when we first applied to B&NES to run the building, to today. If you’re free, please do join us on Saturday, 13th November, 10 am – 4pm.”

The SWALLOW cafe will be open from 9 am until 3 pm as part of the Open Day. Thanks to Wessex Water, the first 100 people who visit the Hive Café will be given a special SWALLOW water bottle.

SWALLOW want to promote the benefits of drinking water and once people have their water bottles, staff will happily fill them up with tap water to make sure people stay well hydrated!

The SWALLOW Café at the Hive provides employment training for local people with learning disabilities, both in the kitchen and front of house. The café is open Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday 8.30am – 3.30pm, for eat in and takeaway.