In recent years Farr Community Hall has seen a large increase in use and the need for more space has become apparent. Activity in the community has shown that with current footfall through the doors, and lack of available spaces when needed, action had to be taken to increase available spaces within the Hall. There has been a rolling open public forum with the focus on available space and utilisation, discussions about this have gone through various formal and informal consultations. This process has resulted in lots of organic feedback from the community as to what people are seeking and what we can currently accomplish. We are aware that we can not achieve everything.
To achieve more space, to enable several rooms to become more accessible (and therefore open to suggestions of future use from the community residents), the current plans have evolved from an early sketch drawing dating from 2016. The improvement work has been split into phases; Phase 3, which was completed in 2024, included the link corridor and upgrading of the Bunachton Room and Duntelchaig Room have been completed and both rooms are now used on a regular basis.
Phase 4 is now about to begin.
Phase 4 includes adding dedicated storage space to the rear of the Hall, freeing up both the Green Room, and Blue Room (either side of the stage). In addition, we will be Increasing the size of the office located adjacent to the Green Room. The current porch will be demolished and a new entrance foyer created, to allow more leisurely congregating, this will flow into an expanded Clachan Room leading out to a newly created outdoor seating space. The Clachan Room size will be significantly increased to accommodate more people and allow the space to better function. And finally the main toilets will be fully refurbished, creating individual units to meet modern expectations.
We know this has been a long time coming, and we appreciate everyone’s patience. The planning permission and building warrant have been passed, quotes have come in from builders. We have just been granted SCBF funding and are greatly appreciative of their ongoing support for this community project.
We are grateful to the community for their help in getting the Hall to this stage. May we ask for your patience while the work is underway as inevitably there will be some disruption.
Regular updates will be given as we know how busy the hall is and how important it is to so many people in our community. We anticipate being able to begin work in June 2025 and we will keep the community up to date as things progress.