The Wellington City Council (WCC) has allocated $3.4 million to upgrade WCC owned, Newtown Community Centre run community facilities in Newtown. These facilities are the Newtown Community & Cultural Centre, Network Newtown and Newtown Hall on Daniell Street. The Newtown Residents Association, the Newtown Community Centre and the Wellington City Council are working together to ensure the people of Newtown are at the centre of deciding what these community facilities may look like.
Over the last year a lot of work has been put into seeking out your opinions, ideas and dreams for a community facility upgrade for Newtown. Watch the video or read the report below to hear more about what we did to hear your voices, and what the Newtown community thought we should spend the money on! This page will be kept up to date with the latest news on the project, so keep an eye on it. We had the first workshop of three with our newly appointed architects, WSP OPUS on Saturday 28th July - it went super well! Thanks to everyone who came along and gave us your awesome ideas on what we should spend the sweet sweet cash on.
If you weren't able to make it, we'd love to hear your ideas in this super quick SURVEY. 
What: Newtown Community Facility: Community Design Worskhop
When: Saturday 28th July, 12noon-3pm Where: Newtown Community & Cultural Centre, corner Rintoul & Colombo Streets, Newtown. From 12-12.30pm there will be a free curry lunch (yum!) accompanied by live music. From 12.30-3pm we’ll have some displays set up and we invite you to give us your awesome ideas specifically relating to the upgrades you’d like to see to the three buildings, Newtown Community Centre, Network Newtown & Newtown Hall on Daniell Street. You are welcome to drop in and fill in a couple of quick post it notes, or stick around for a cup of tea and a treat, chat to the architects and get a tour of the Community Centre. This is a family friendly event, there will be face painting and lego for the kids. We’ll post any updates to the event on our Facebook event page. If you can't make it to the workshop, we would still love to hear your thoughts in this quick SURVEY. Just as a wee heads up, there will be 3 workshops (including the above one) over the next 4 months:
Cushla Thurston
Cushla lives in South Wellington and has two young children who attend an early education centre in Newtown. Her previous work includes : $13M Redevelopment of Heretaunga College in Upper Hutt; $4M Performing Arts Auditorium for Sacred Heart College in Lower Hutt and the Master Planning for Wellington East Girls’ College currently under construction. Cushla will be the Project Architect and main point of contact for the Newtown Community Facilities project. She will lead the design team and community consultation work and is very excited about playing a role in the upgrade of these important facilities for Newtown Community. Bruce Curtain Bruce has 25 years’ experience as a Principal Architect is our National Technical Director - Architecture. He is based in Wellington and for many years was also the manager of our Wellington Architecture Studio. He has significant project experience that is diverse and technically complex. His projects include significant redevelopment projects Wellington East Girls College, Heretaunga and Porirua Colleges, and the multi-award winning Carterton Events Centre. Bruce is also passionate about innovation and sustainability and is always looking for opportunities to incorporate appropriate sustainability into the projects he is involved with. Carinnya Feaunati Carinnya is an Architectural Graduate with a passion for the sustainable development of communities and has recently represented New Zealand at the Young Pacific Leaders Conference in Hawaii, and has presented at the COP21 UNESCO Conference in Paris. Most recently Carinnya has been working on the Pasifika Malae project with Victoria University undertaking community and cultural group consultation as part of the masterplanning and concept design phase of the project to provide a culturally focused facility for the University and wider community. Her consultation experience includes, working with a community in the Naval Base suburb of Baguio, Philippines known for its slum housing and lack of adequate amenities. The group formed a social enterprise, and Carinnya the participatory design workshops to develop an upgrade of the local school. Carinnya is looking forward to bringing her skills in understanding community needs and working with people from different cultural backgrounds to the Newtown Project. Phil Orde Phil is an experienced Principal Architect in our Wellington Architecture Studio with strengths in relationship management and leadership of project teams. His extensive experience includes Wellington community based projects whilst in his role as Principal Architect for Wellington City Council. His work on projects such as the improvements to the Aro Valley Centre, Creation of Churton Park Centre, Instigating the Rintoul Street Community House, and Thistle Hall. This experience means he has an in depth understanding of Council objectives and requirements in relation to redevelopment projects within the Wellington community. To learn more about WSP Opus check out their website here! 
The VideoThis short video summarises the the project to date. Check it out!
The ReportThis report summarises the findings of the community outreach that has been undertaken in Newtown to find out what people want in a Community facility upgrade.
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