The South Coast’s newest arts and heritage venue, God’s House Tower (who we featured in the June 2019 edition of Refurb Projects Journal), is thrilled to announce it has been nominated for not one but TWO awards!
The £3.1million refurbishment project of the 700 year old building – which completed in October 2019 – has been shortlisted for two categories in the RICS Social Impact Awards. This is the inaugural year for this competition, which aims to recognise “the built environment’s positive and transformational contribution to society.” GHT has been nominated in both the Heritage and Leisure categories.
Director of GHT and ‘a space’ arts Daniel Crow said: “This is fantastic news! We know that bringing GHT back to life will have an incredible impact on Southampton’s cultural landscape, reanimating the Old Town and making all those who enjoy art and heritage proud of the city. Congratulations and thanks to architect Dan Talkes from Purcell and Peter Grosvenor from Greenwood Projects who was the surveyor on the project. They did a brilliant job and were instrumental in working with ‘a space’ arts to reopen this incredible ancient monument.”
God’s House Tower is a new arts and heritage venue housed in one of Southampton’s most important scheduled ancient monuments. It now houses a Contemporary Gallery, a Collections Gallery, a four-storey heritage exhibition called Stories Behind the Stones, a cafe, performance space, shop and library.
About God’s House Tower
God’s House Tower is a distinctive new arts and heritage venue housed in a Grade I scheduled ancient monument in Southampton’s Old Town. Initially built to form the southeastern corner of the town’s medieval defensive walls, across its 700-year history the Tower and its surrounding buildings have been used as the town’s gunnery, prison, warehouse, mortuary, and from 1961 to 2011 as Southampton’s Museum of Archaeology. In 2019 it reopened to the public after a £3.1million refurbishment project with a permanent exhibition on the Tower’s history, two new art galleries featuring works from prestigious south coast collections and new commissions. It is also home to a Hoxton Bakehouse cafe, a library, shop and event space. www.godshousetower.org.uk
About ‘a space’ arts
‘a space’ arts strives to support emerging artists and inspire audiences from Southampton and the surrounding regions by creating opportunities to engage with high quality arts and heritage experiences. Since 2000 we have developed and managed a project portfolio to attain our goals, including the Northam Road Gallery, the Bargate Monument Galley, ArtVaults, the Arches Studios, Tower House and the Sorting Office. In 2018 ‘a space’ became an Arts Council England National Portfolio Organisation and will be delivering a range of new projects across the next four years to complement GHT and the project portfolio. www.aspacearts.org.uk
