Greetings! This is the last blog of the year for the RUSS community hub as we prepare for the Christmas season and take a well-earned break.
Our volunteers have been busy over the last few weeks getting the site and materials prepped and stored safety out of the rain for the winter. We managed a final site day yesterday and just in time too as the weather has definitely turned. Here’s a few things we’ve been up to;
Mega material pick-up day
Back on 20th October we organised a big volunteer effort to pick-up materials from several locations as well as dismantling part of an artwork in order to reclaim the adobe bricks it was made out of. We even managed to squeeze in putting a coat of paint on the site hoardings to smarten them up. We had two teams of volunteers – a massive thanks to everyone who came and helped out. We were blessed with sunshine and achieved everything we aimed to. A few special mentions have to go to:
- Tom and the team at Bold Tendencies who helped us to reclaim the adobe bricks from an artwork they commissioned in Peckham. Check out the awesome work these guys do here; http://boldtendencies.com/
- Our volunteer van driver for the day – Ian. We would not have managed the move without someone able to manoeuvre a Luton van like this man. He pulled an epic shift and we thank you!
Shipping Containers
It took a lot more organisation than we thought but we managed to finally get some shipping containers on to our site for storage. A big shout out to Mr Box who not only patiently answered our seemingly endless questions but gave us a special deal for the containers they are renting to us in support of our community project.
If you need to buy or rent shipping containers we would highly recommend them; https://www.mrbox.co.uk/
Materials from one side of the site….to the other
Well, we are learning a lot about building logistics…we made a miscalculation when we delivered the materials we collected previously to the site. We put them on the far side of the site expecting to also put our containers in the same location but then due to site conditions we needed to put the containers on the opposite side of the site.
We’ve hence spent the last few weekends carrying the materials across the site to get them into the containers and out of the rain. A big thanks to those who have helped out with this chore. As of yesterday everything is safety stored away for the winter.
Oh and a good tip – don’t rely on tarpaulins or plastic sheeting to keep your materials dry – the foxes love to chew through plastic and tarpaulins get blown open!
As well as all of the above we’ve been finalising our detail design and developing our programme. Our plan is to release our building programme in the new year at which point you’ll be able to sign-up for getting involved with the actual build.
So one last thanks to everyone who has supported the RUSS community hub project in 2018. Have a wonderful Christmas and new year and we look forward to seeing you at a community hub event in the new year!
