£1m bid to save church

Jan 5 2009 by Emma Davison, Huddersfield Daily Examiner

The team then decided that the best way to transform the fortunes of the run-down building was to provide not only a place of worship but also a building that the whole community could use and enjoy.

Project coordinator Gill, of Upper Cumberworth, was desperate to save it and embarked on an unrelenting mission to raise the £1m cash needed.

Gill was born in Hunslet and first came to the church with her parents when she was just three weeks old. Even though she moved out of the area, she has remained a member ever since.

Gill, a personal assistant for the Wakefield Diocese, said: “I’ve been a member of the church my whole life, so it means a tremendous amount to me. But many members of the congregation had left in recent years and it was very dilapidated, so unless we found a way to make it viable again it probably would have been closed.

“The church is in a very deprived area: one of those areas that’s been left behind. There wasn’t any real community centre and not much nursery provision or facilities for young people.

“This was our opportunity to create a place that all the people in Hunslet could use and benefit from – to bring the church back to being the heart of the community like it used to be all those years ago.”

Gill enlisted the help of Huddersfield architects One 17 Design to redevelop the site and make it fit for modern use and relevant to the local community.