The Colombo Centre provides opportunities to stay active and reduce isolation combining friendship, fitness and fun. Our partners at Coin Street need your help to make the Colombo Centre as inclusive as possible. Southwark Council have a pot of money for local projects (the money comes from hotel and office developments in the area) and organisations are being asked to nominate a project. We think the Colombo Centre deserves some funding.
Since being transformed by the community in the 1970s from the old Sainsbury's staff canteen into a multi-purpose community centre, it has hosted youth clubs, playgroups, coffee mornings, sports, tea dances, dance clubs, art groups across multiple generations.
The Colombo Centre currently combines a community gym, dance studio, community room and kitchen, outdoor pitches, therapy rooms and studios and offers free and low cost activities across seven days a week for families, seniors, young people and those on low incomes. Their weekly sessions include youth clubs, family fitness, gentle gardening, coffee mornings, dance classes, arts and crafts, aerobics and football coaching.
Coin Street wants to ensure Colombo is a space which can welcome everyone in the community equally and can stand out as a truly inclusive gym. The project would invest in the gym space to support three areas:
Disability Gym - remodelling the space to make it welcoming and accessible for disabled and non-disabled people to get active together (we are already working with Disability Advice Service who are keen to use Colombo as a hub for their projects)
Youth Gym - they have been piloting a successful youth gym on Friday evenings and want to develop this further
Seniors Gym - they run a popular Feel Good Saturdays session for seniors combining spin, yoga, circuits and a healthy lunch and support will enable them to invest further in the equipment and facilities to keep people active as they get older.
To vote for The Colombo Centre, click here!