New Screen Heritage Centre for Norfolk gets green light from Heritage Lottery Fund

Improving public access to film education and community facilities for all

Norfolk’s best-loved cinema is about to get even better with the creation of a new Screen Heritage Centre at the historic Grade 1 listed Cinema City site – thanks to National Lottery players. Out-dated and difficult to reach rooms on the first floor will be transformed into accessible, well-equipped and user-friendly spaces for education and community use. A new lift will significantly improve access to the centre, making education and learning activities truly available to everyone.

The charity Cinema City Ltd has been given the go-ahead from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) to begin work on their new Screen Heritage Centre in February 2016. The charity was originally awarded an HLF grant in August 2014 for the first phase of its Norfolk at the Pictures project to preserve and share Norfolk’s cinema heritage. Now, the HLF has agreed to fund phase two, contributing £541,000 to the total project costs of £810,000, and the eagerly anticipated Screen Heritage Centre is set to become a reality.

Chair of Cinema City Ltd, Philip Easter said, ‘This is a real boost for both our film education work and for community engagement with our cinema heritage. We will be able to expand our education activities and enhance our provision for underserved groups, including young people living with a disability and people living with dementia. It will make a real difference to what we can achieve and I would like to thank the HLF for their ongoing support and confidence in our ambitions.’

In addition to the HLF grant Cinema City Ltd has raised over £150,000 match funding from charitable trusts, organisations and individuals.  Norfolk charities, including Norwich Town Close Charity, Geoffrey Watling Charity, John Jarrold Trust and the Paul Bassham Trust, contributed over 90% of the match funding. Project Director Claire Chapman said, ‘We are extremely grateful to everyone who has contributed to this much-welcomed community project, including our partners Picturehouse Cinemas. I would particularly like to give a special mention to all the local charities that have given us so much support and enabled us to raise the additional funding required to see the project through to completion. We cannot thank them enough.’

Sir John Hurt, CBE Patron of Cinema City, who launched the charity’s fundraising appeal in September 2014, expressed his delight on hearing the news, ‘It is wonderful that such a fantastic resource will soon exist in my adopted home of Norfolk. Film has the ability to touch peoples’ lives in a very special way and I am proud to support initiatives such as this that give more people access to film education and our important film heritage’.

Through its education arm Cinema Plus, the charity has already delivered an extensive and highly successful range of events and activities across the county as part of the Norfolk at the Pictures project. Over the last year thousands of people across Norfolk have taken part in events and contributed their own memories, documents and stories. Cinema heritage trail books have been produced for Norwich and Great Yarmouth, a commemorative Norfolk at the Pictures magazine, in collaboration with Archant, is currently on sale and a website norfolkatthepictures.org.uk provides a permanent archive. A specially produced feature length documentary film is set to be released early next year.

The Screen Heritage Centre, designed by local architect Charles Emberson, will host a range of film education related activities, screenings, talks and workshops that will explore the heritage of cinema in the region. In addition the charity is looking forward to working in partnership with organisations including Equal Lives, Age UK and the Norfolk & Suffolk Dementia Alliance, to develop more activities for currently underserved groups including people living with dementia and young people living with a disability.

The Screen Heritage Centre is due to open next summer.

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Notes

Norfolk at the Pictures is a £810,000 project to preserve and share Norfolk’s cinema heritage and create a new accessible Screen Heritage Centre at Cinema City. Planning permission and listed building consent has been granted for alterations, designed by Norfolk based architect Charles Emberson, that will enhance accessibility in sympathy with the historic nature of the building. The work will be carried out by Norfolk Professional Building Services.

Contributors to the project include: Heritage Lottery Fund, Norwich Town Close Estate Charity, Paul Bassham Trust, Geoffrey Watling Charitable Trust, John Jarrold Trust, Garfield Weston Foundation, The Ranworth Trust, Alderman Norman Foundation, Lady Hind Trust, RC Snelling Charitable Trust, Charles Littlewood Hill Charitable Trust, Veneziana Trust, Timothy Colman Charitable Trust, Norfolk County Council and the Round Table organisation.

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About the Heritage Lottery Fund

Thanks to National Lottery players, we invest money to help people across the UK explore, enjoy and protect the heritage they care about – from the archaeology under our feet to the historic parks and buildings we love, from precious memories and collections to rare wildlife. www.hlf.org.uk @heritagelottery @HLFEoE

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Cinema City Ltd

Cinema City Ltd (formerly the Norfolk & Norwich Film Theatre Ltd) has been dedicated to using the power of the moving image for education and learning since the charity was founded in 1966. The charity cares for the historic Cinema City site and provides inspiring education opportunities for people across Norfolk through its education arm Cinema Plus. Cinema Plus aims to develop cultural participation irrespective of age or ability and offers an extensive, year-round programme of activities, workshops and courses to enable people across the county to engage with the moving-image. www.cinemaplus.org.uk @CinemaPlus @NorfolkATP

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Cinema City and Picturehouse Cinemas Ltd

In 2007, following a significant capital programme, Cinema City reopened in partnership with Picturehouse Cinemas Ltd as a three screen cinema with some of the most modern cinema facilities in the country.

Picturehouse Cinemas run the film programming, restaurant and bar under a lease and service level agreement with Cinema City Ltd and has contributed £50,000 partnership funding to this project, which will bring underused and underdeveloped areas of the building up the standards of the rest of the site.

Now owned by Cineworld, Picturehouse Cinemas was formed in 1989 to challenge the multiplex model and provide cinemas that serve their communities in city-centre locations. www.picturehouse.co.uk