Work to clear site for €4.5m West Cork arts centre to begin next week

DEMOLITION work is due to start next week to clear a site for West Cork’s new €4.5 million arts centre.

Contractors will knock Skibbereen’s landmark Wolfe’s Bakery building in the town centre, marking the first phase of the “enabling works” for the construction of the new building for the West Cork Arts Centre (WCAC).

The wall linking the site, situated off Townshend Street, to the Caol Stream, will be demolished and a temporary access bridge will be installed to facilitate the entry of machinery on to the site.

The contract for the enabling works has been awarded to McCarthy Plant Hire. The pre-qualification process for the construction contract for the new building is currently out to tender on the Government’s e-tenders website.

Plans for the centre, which have been in the pipeline for several years, received a massive boost in 2008 when international financiers and philanthropists, William and Judith Bollinger, agreed to donate €375,000 towards the project.

Mr Bollinger is the founding partner of Egerton Capital, a leading fund management business in London. Ms Bollinger is chairman of ABG Sundal Collier, a Nordic investment bank, and a trustee of the University of Pennsylvania.

The couple, who are naturalised Irish citizens and own a West Cork home, are passionate about the arts, architecture and education, and agreed to match all donations to the building development fund up to their pledged amount.

It followed the anchor funding of €1.5m from the Department of Arts and €1.4m from Cork County Council. The centre now needs to raise just 2%, or €80,000, from other sources and is still actively involved in fundraising.

Donaghy and Dimond Architects, Dublin are heading up the design team for the new centre, following a major architectural competition last year.

WCAC was established in 1985 and is publicly funded. It covers the Skibbereen and Bantry urban and rural area that stretches from the Beara Peninsula in the west, to Clonakilty in the east, from Dunmanway in the north, to the islands of Cape Clear and Sherkin in the south.

It is hoped the new centre will provide a quality arts facility and a new social space for the community, enhanced workshop, dance, performance and film club facilities and improved exhibition space and studio spaces for artists.