January Update

This year promises to be a very exciting one, and certainly the biggest yet, for the Bridgend Farmhouse Renovation Project. Lots of exciting updates below and things starting back for 2017, so read on for more information:

The Build Begins
Today (January 30th) the renovation work on Bridgend farmhouse, and construction of the four community workshops begins! After many hard years of work to get to this point, we are very excited to be working with Cornhill Building Services to deliver the build of a community owned and run Centre for Learning, Eating and Exercise at Bridgend. We currently expect the work to be complete by November 2017. So, if you're interested in using the centre and workshops at all from that point on, feel free to start getting in contact about that now. More information on the build is available here and on request.
We apologise for any disruption on and around site during this period. If you've any queries, ideas or feedback on the build work, please contact us.
There will be chances for some tours during the process, at two or three points, to see the work developing. Information to follow in due course.

We will also be continuing our weekly drop-in sessions on site every Wednesday and Sunday. These are to ensure you can stay at the heart of the developments on site, be an active part in shaping the garden, land and barns, and can see and be part of the renovation process throughout.

Ownership Complete
At the end of November 2016 Bridgend Inspiring Growth completed the asset transfer and took official community ownership of Bridgend Farmhouse and its surrounding barns and garden. This is thanks to all the legal advice and assistance of Davidson Chalmers who helped us finalise all the necessary legal documents. We are delighted to see the Farmhouse site brought into community ownership through an asset transfer from City of Edinburgh Council. The legal details/imposed burdens ensure that its use in the future must be solely for the purposes of being a Centre for Learning, Eating and Exercise, thus ensuring the site is always used for social and charitable purposes going forward, regardless of who is running it.

In Other News:

Weekly Drop-in Starts Back (Sunday 6th February & Wednesday 9th Feb, 11-3)
Every week we run two open drop-in sessions on site. They are open to all to attend, and include free hot drinks, and homemade soup and bread. Activities this year will include; Pizza Oven and Rocket Stove Building; Raised Bed Building; Gardening; Timber charring and cladding of the workshops; a wildlife garden; and lots more. See here and below for more details : http://www.bridgendfarmhouse.org.uk/drop-in-days.html

Community Café and Cooking Group starts (Mondays from January 30th)
This term we are continuing our successful community café and cooking group at Sandy's Community Centre, in partnership with Adult Learning Link. There are still places to join the course, which will involve the chance to gain three qualifications, work as a team , and gain valuable experience in catering.
We will be providing community lunches at Sandy's for 12 weeks too over the next few months. For more information follow this link or to sign up/refer on, contact: [email protected]

Bridgend Eco Bothy Self Build.
Working in partnership with SEDA Build the Bridgend Eco-Bothy Build will be running between May and July this year. It will be a community build and there will be lots of chances to take part to learn new skills and create this new Bothy in one of the barns. It's a really exciting project and we can't wait for it to get started. More information available here, and to follow soon.

Working Groups
Bridgend Inspiring Growth now has 5 working groups:

• The BUILDING Group
• The LAND Group
• The WORKSHOPS Group
• The FOOD Group
• The BUSINESS Group

These are open to anyone to join. If you would like to be involved in any of these particular parts of the project and working groups please let us know.

Moving to Mailchimp.
At some point this year we are going to move our newsletter updates to mail-chimp. We are finding that anyone with a gmail address has Mailchimp news sent to their promotions list and so may not see it. If you use googlemail/gmail currently but have an alternative email address we could send you information on to, please can you let us know.

We hope to see you all down at Bridgend Farmhouse very soon!