Peebles' Eastgate theatre seeks funds for upgrade
- Published
A theatre in the Borders is making an urgent bid to secure funding to redevelop its facilities.
The Eastgate Theatre in Peebles is currently seeking to upgrade its auditorium at an estimated cost of £410,000.
The majority will be funded through European Union and charitable grants as well as public donations.
However, it needs support from Peebles common good fund in order to unlock backing from other organisations.
They require about 10% of their contributions to be matched by a third party.
The theatre project has recently applied for two grants, one for £80,000 and one for £30,000, meaning it needs common good support of £8,600 and £3,000.
Match funding
The £80,000 grant will come from WREN, a non-profit company which funds projects with money raised by the landfill tax, while the £30,000 grant will come from the Land Trust, a land management and greenspace charity.
The development project is in a race against time to secure a large grant from the EU's Leader programme.
The theatre has been offered £150,000, on the condition that it matches that funding with money from elsewhere, such as the WREN and Land Trust grants.
Eastgate Theatre has raised a substantial part of the money, but is still £70,000 short of the amount needed to match the Leader programme funding,
The deadline for meeting this condition is 30 August, meaning the Peebles common good fund sub-committee has been brought forward to Monday 30 July, in order to maximise the chances of securing the additional funding on time.
'Excellent space'
Caroline Adam, the theatre's general manager, said they had been working on the development project for two years and a major step forward was now in sight.
"Fourteen years ago the Eastgate was created by the determination of the local community to realise the dream of having a space where all sorts of arts could flourish," she said.
"Today performances in the theatre attract audiences of 21,000 a year and more than 40,000 people visit the Eastgate for other reasons."
She said the development would create an "excellent theatre space ready to meet future demand".
"We are very close but it won't happen at all unless we reach the £70,000 target with this final fundraising push," she added.
Story by local democracy reporter Joseph Anderson