We’re excited to announce that Blystra Arts have been awarded funding from Great Western Railway’s Customer and Community Improvement Fund to deliver a brand new creative project in Newquay, Stories from the Station (SFTS), a creative heritage project that explores the impact Newquay’s railway has had on the town. Stories from the Station (SFTS), will work with people from across Newquay and will use film, visual arts, creative writing and performance to explore the heritage of Newquay’s railway station and the Atlantic Coast branch line and the impact they’ve had on the town, its infrastructure and community. SFTS will be delivered between April 2025 to March 2026 and will be linked in with this year’s Lantern Parade activity, another of Blystra’s projects, to give it an even wider reach. The project will involve the delivery of 15 to 20 creative workshops across Newquay; the making of four heritage films; the delivery of a celebration event as part of the Railway 200 celebrations on the 27th of Sept and the creation of four new pieces of visual art. Using film, theatre, creative writing and visual art, and working alongside the community as well as 20 partner organisations we want to tell some of the untold stories of Newquay’s station, its characters and history. Newquay Museum will be a key partner, and we’ll use their knowledge of old Newquay and their archive as our starting point. This project will use a shared sense of place to bring people together through their shared heritage.
The Blystra team are so excited to receive this funding, Ellen, the company’s Artistic Director said:
“This year GWR had 300 applications to their Community Fund from organisations from across their network, who wanted to deliver projects to celebrate this historic year – the 200th anniversary of the start of the railway. We are absolutely thrilled that we are one of the organisations picked to receive this funding, and we’re so excited to get started on delivering this project in the community. We’re working alongside more than 20 partners in the community to ensure this funding has the widest reach as possible and that the stories we pull out of the archive and explore can be heard by as many people as possible. The railway coming to Newquay had such a huge impact on our town, it was the start of Newquay as we know it today. We wanted to tell some of the stories of people who were involved in this development along the way and the story of the railway itself and the impact the railway station had on the town.”
Watch this space for more information about how you can get involved in the Stories from the Station project in the coming weeks, and also follow the Blystra Arts on social media for updates and information about the project.
