Umbrella Sussex Needs Your Help!
TOBY BULA-EDGE
A new Community Eco Hub is the next aim of Umbrella Sussex – the group behind the Library of Things, Make and Mend, and Save the Convent Campaign. They are currently crowdfunding for the project and are looking for help from the community. The hub would combine climate action and anti-poverty work, focused on their well-established mending and lending schemes.
The building would provide space for the established Hastings Library of Things and Make and Mend, and would also play host to new initiatives like Hack Space – a shared community workshop for fixers, makers and inventors, and that would repair items, collaborate and develop new ideas, and tackle waste.
From Shore to Shed would combine beach cleaning with creative reuse. Materials collected from local beaches will be sorted and made available to schools, artists, community groups and makers. From these safe and renewable waste materials, creative projects can be born.
Providing affordable meeting rooms, a community kitchen and fully accessible facilities are also central to the building’s conception.
To ensure that the building is never sold and always available to the people of Hastings, Umbrella Sussex plans to put the building into a trust. It would be retrofitted to high environmental standards, to tie in with the group’s aim to tackle the climate crisis – as well as to inspire local residents and businesses to do their part.
Christine, spokesperson for Umbrella Sussex, says: “I started Make and Mend in 2019, and we’ve always struggled with space. Our two regular volunteers work incredibly hard to keep up with demand, but we simply can’t fit in any more volunteers. I’m so excited that, with control over our own space, we’ll be able to open every day and welcome many more people to get involved.”
To find out more or to donate. visit: crowdfunder.co.uk/p/community-eco-hub
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