A rundown ‘dead space’ in Tenby overlooking the North Beach and picturesque harbour, that used to be home to an amusement arcade, is providing an ongoing project to bring the area back into life, with colourful artwork and a special seaside mural.
Looking at the area now, which leads down to the North Walk, it’s hard to believe that it was once home to a seaside amusement arcade discreetly hidden behind the walkways up the cliffs, up until the late 90s, when it was most recently know as ‘Ocean Leisure’.
Plans to spruce-up the area have been taking shape, most recently when an enthusiastic group of Duke of Edinburgh candidates from Greenhill School came down and did a brilliant job litter picking and scrubbing the floors and walls of the space.
Tom Moses of the CWBR Youth project (PLANED) was also involved, with the group from Greenhill accompanied by youth workers Leah Walker, Chloe Lewis and Miss Fay John (SWEET teacher).
“This is the first stage to the community project aimed at making it a much nicer place which people will be able to use for a picnic when it rains, or just as a meeting point,” said Tenby’s community engagement officer Anne Draper of the ‘Urban Thinkscape’ project.
“One of the next steps to do is to paint most of the walls bright colours, with a portion at the end in blackboard paint to act as a graffiti wall. The idea is to have a mural over a lot of the walls with a coastal theme.
“It would be great if people could send in drawings or paintings, digital or on paper, that they have done, with a coastal theme, to be part of this mural.
“More entries are needed to be part of the mural. These can be anything related to the coast, so can be animals, fish, plants or man made things like bucket and spades or fishing kit, or anything else – the more varied the better. All contributions will be used,” continued Anne.
The idea of this project is to make the area a space where there are activities that encourage children and their families to interact with each other, so one possibility is to have a picnic table with images of things that could be found around the beach on it so it could be used as for a scavenge hunt.
Another is to have a small rowing boat fixed there as a seat for small children with images on it designed to spark their imagination and encourage storytelling.
“The intention is also to create an area towards the back of the space for teenagers with a graffiti wall, and maybe some seating,” explained Anne.
“It is also hoped to put in a fishing net along the gap between the space and the bank to discourage littering, and any help to source this would be great.”
Anne told members of the Town Council at their most recent meeting, that pupils would be returning in March to paint the area.
The Mayor, Cllr Sam Skyrm-Blackhall said it was good to see a ‘dead space’ being utilised.
Anyone interested can send designs to: [email protected] or drop them into the Tenby Town Council office at the De Valence Pavilion on Upper Frog Street.
