The Old Cowshed
The photo below of Cheddar shows the old cowshed, with other farm buildings in the middle ground. The foreground shows the site when archaeological work took place prior to the building of The Kings of Wessex School in the early 1960s.
We had decided that we needed to move from our premises in Wedmore, and looked round for somewhere else affordable, but every place we looked at the rent was way out of our price range. We had a Partnership Agreement with Kings of Wessex School (now an Academy of course) and they said there was a room they were not using very much, but might not be suitable for us. Over the years, the building has been used as a classroom, including an ICT suite in the early days of computers in schools. Before the IT4TT restoration began it was used as a store room. When we saw it, it was full of old artwork, general storage, bits and pieces from Duke of Edinburgh Awards etc - floor to ceiling; wall to wall with all sorts of stuff. But we could see it would be ideal with a bit of work, so we were able to agree that in return for the Grant which they paid, we would use that for the rent for our new premises, so work began to build an internal wall to make two rooms, a new door from the building to the car park, plus ramp and railings. There were walls needed to create a kitchen and disabled toilet. Benches were fitted on both sides of the room, and the work was progressing nicely. There are a number of photos showing the work required to convert the cowshed - click here.
Due to circumstances beyond our control the move from The George in Wedmore was a very hasty affair. We rang our Chair, who was a deputy head at Kings of Wessex School, and he mobilized their techinical department, who came with the school bus and wrapped all the monitors, computers, printers etc in bubble wrap and took them to the school and stored them in a secure cupboard. Our Centre Coordinator rang her husband, and asked him to bring the Landrover and cattle trailer (which is always kept clean, for tuantely!) and another friend who had a van, and also a few people to help, and between 1pm and 9pm we moved out! The furniture and anything non-electrical was stored in the Centre Coordinator's farm and covered with a tarpaulin - literally in an Old Cowshed, which wasn't being used at the time as it was summer - in the winter it would be full of calves!
Work progressed on the new Old Cowshed and in September 2009 (10 years after we first opened) when we moved into our new premises.
It took a lot of imagination to envisage it as the professional looking, fully accessible, training centre it now is.
