AN open day was held in St Ives to enable local people to see what has been happening with the Old Vicarage Flats project ahead of the start of major refurbishment works.

Local people saw what the progress of the Old Vicarage Flats project and to hear their stories and memories of the historic building. More than 50 people took the opportunity to tour the inside of the building before it closes for the start of the major refurbishment works.

Considerable preparatory work ahead of the start of the major refurbishment has taken place. This has involved replacing the roof, repairing windows and removing asbestos along with some internal demolition work.

The team have also worked with National Grid and BT to sort out the power and energy infrastructure needed to support the conversion of the building into flats, and with members of the Kensa Engineering Ground Source heating design team who will shortly be drilling the bore holes required for the installation of the intended ground source heat pump system.

Known originally as the Parsonage and built in the late 1830’s, the building was home to the Vicars of St Ives until the early 1950’s when Canon Jenkin moved into a newly constructed vicarage off St Andrew’s Street.

The building was then taken over by St Ives Borough Council who converted the upper stories into four flats while the ground floor was owned by Cornwall County Council and used by a number of local organisations, including a nursery, the local WI and camera club.

The Old Vicarage lay empty from 2016 until the local community through the St Ives Community Land Trust raised the funds to buy the property in 2019 with the aim of rescuing the historic building and converting it to provide much needed affordable homes for the local community.

A spokesperson for the St Ives Community Land Trust said: “We are very aware of the importance of preserving this historic building and have worked closely with the architects to retain as many of the original features as possible. These include the sash windows and the beautiful banister.

“We are hoping to confirm details of the contractor who will be carrying out the next phase of the scheme within the next two weeks, with work on renovating and converting the inside of the building due to begin before Christmas.

“The refurbishment is expected to take around six months to complete. We know that many local people are struggling to find somewhere to live in St Ives and expect there to be considerable interest in these flats. As previously stated the flats will only be available to people with strong local connections within the parish.”

Details of the applications process, including the criteria which will be used, are currently being developed and will be widely publicised once they have been confirmed.

The spokesperson added: “We would like to thank everyone who has helped us to reach this point. This has been a real community-led project, with more than £240,000 raised through the community share issue in 2019, along with many individual donations and via mortgage with Triodos Bank.” 

Earlier this year the trust was awarded £750,000 from St Ives Town Deal Fund. This grant is funding the refurbishment works and is enabling the trust to deliver their pledge to provide high quality affordable flats for local people to rent.

The trust are continuing to encourage further financial support to enable them to look further into advances in technology to get Smart delivery systems for utilities and services in order to keep costs as low as possible for our future tenants.

A short film about the project can be viewed via this link: www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwpIIl-g8js