All you have to do is follow the straightforward instructions below and make sure your original design reaches us by Mon 12th August to be in with a chance of having your creation on the front of our next listings flyer.

Trinity is a unique community arts space and amazing independent live music venue so we're looking for an artistic design that will inspire others.

We want to use our flyers as a platform for artists' work so, the winning design will feature on a printed flyer (5000 copies) distributed across the city! The winner will also receive two complimentary tickets to an upcoming gig of their choice*

Technical info

• Flyer size: A6

• Dimensions: 105mm x 150mm + 3mm bleed each side (Design can be portrait or landscape)

• Resolution: 300dpi

• Colour model: CMYK

• Format: Tiff/Jpeg

What's next?

Design your cover by print, or by hand and scan in, and email your image to info@3ca.org.uk with the subject heading Trinity Flyer Design

Be sure to include your details**:

• Artist name

• Artist website

• Artist email

We will be running our flyer design competition every other month so please keep an eye on our website with regards to future competitions.

See Mbrk's work (our latest winner)  here

*Subject to availability

**We will feature the winner's contact details on the flyer – please let us know if you do not wish to do this

Next Sunday 23rd June we're hosting an intimate one-off show for Goldfrapp as a warm-up for their up-coming festival appearances. Tickets are flying out already so act fast! Available from See Tickets or Bristol Ticket Shop 0117 929 9008

Also, this week we're very excited to announce that we have teamed up with Asian Arts Agency to bring you kickass Canadian 5-piece world fusion dance band, Delhi 2 Dublin, playing here Friday 23rd of August.

Meanwhile Figure 8 Festival, here Saturday 28th September have just announced indie veteran's Dodgy as festival headliner with more acts added to the bill including the fabulous Brighton-based folk artist Chris T-T. They are joined at this exciting charity festival by the likes of , Mumford & Sons and Laura Marling collaborator Pete Roe and Leeds rockers ALASKA as well as former King Blues member Josie Ghost, London singer/songwriter Katie Malco and Northampton’s answer to Damien Rice, Joel Harries, the man behind Men Diamler, Richard Abberline, Mat Motte’s new band Shock Horror and up and coming Camden indie kids Velveteen. Plus plenty of local acts too.

For more info visit our events pages

2013 has been a difficult year to secure funding for our Community Garden project and after several applications, a short term grant came through, allowing us to continue to this years growing season!

Anita O'Flynn, one of our Volunteer Garden Coordinators, is one of the lucky winners this year to receive The World of Difference UK programme funding. The programme gives 500 people the chance to work for a UK charity of their choice and get paid!

Thanks to this funding Anita has been able to set up an all day drop-in session for Women and Children on Wednesdays as well as free gardening sessions on Thursdays with small groups of vulnerable adults from Rethink, Second Step and others.

Awaz Utaoh (South Asian women’s group) has also joined them on Wednesdays and they have been showing us how to make a tandoori oven aand cook from it, which is very exciting and is going to be a great resource for their community garden.

To read more about the garden and Anita's work, visit her blog:

http://worldofdifference.vodafone.co.uk/blogs/anita-o-flynn2012/

Trinity Community Arts are currently part-way through a year-long scheme of works to carry out improvements to the Trinity Centre, Lawrence Hill in Old Market Quarter, Bristol.

We are half-way through a roof-repair works project, funded by English Heritage, Pilgrim Trust and Biffa Award. These essential repairs, due for completion at the end of June will help to protect the fabric of the building long-term.

Trinity has recently been awarded a £30,000 grant from the Ibstock Cory Environmental Trust (ICET) to fund improvements to our heating system, including to run an underfloor-heating system in our large upstairs hall-space. Cory Environmental is one of the UK's leading recycling, waste management and energy recovery companies and its trust, which is also funded by Ibstock Brick Limited through the Landfill Communities Fund, supports community projects across the country. The ICET grant will help to improve the community building, where a wide range of community activities already take place, in order to allow for more activities to happen.

Emma Harvey, Centre Manager for Trinity said; “Anyone who has used the Centre before will know how heating this old converted church is one massive challenge. The support from Ibstock Cory Environmental Trust will help to ensure that the community can make maximum use of the newly developed space in the coming year.”

Angela Haymonds, Secretary of ICET said: “ICET trustees were delighted to support this project. Trinity Community Arts hosts a broad range of arts-based and other community group activities and this project will serve to keep the building warm whilst keeping bills low.”

Angela continued: “This community project is just one of the many ICET has funded through the Landfill Communities Fund (LCF). The scheme offers funding to projects that benefit communities living within 10 miles of a landfill site. Groups interested in submitting projects should visit our website to find out more”.

The work funded by ICET forms part of a much larger scheme, due to start after the roof-repair works conclude, funded by the Big Lottery Reaching Communities Buildings Fund. The wider scheme involves improvements to external grounds, the creation of a new daytime reception and installation of a sprung wooden floor, lighting and drapes in the upstairs hall space to make it suitable for activities such as dance, fitness and performance. The Big Lottery grant will also be used to install a full-height partition upstairs, so that a second smaller hall space will be created, suitable for IT classes, community meetings and smaller functions.

Works are due for completion by the end of 2013 and will be delivered in phases in order to ensure the Centre remains open throughout. Details of the planned works can be downloaded by clicking here. For more information visit www.3ca.org.uk/projects/trinity-centre-development contact 0117 935 1200 or email info@3ca.org.uk.

This period of change and growth cannot happen without your support. We've set up a JustGiving page so that people in the community who care about Trinity can organise their own fundraising activities for the Centre. If you would just like to show your support, you can donate via the Trinity Text Appeal 2013 - text TRIN13 £5 to 70070 to donate to Trinity and make a difference with JustTextGiving by Vodafone.

The Tank Theatre Project is a new young people's theatre group, funded by the Ernest Cook Trust.We're looking for ambitious young people with a passion for acting and/or writing (stories or lyrics) to take part in this exciting new project.

Over 29 Saturdays this summer, you will get to work with award-winning director Dave Lovatt to create your own, contemporary performance, whilst also getting to learn from the master playwrights and what makes their works so great. By the end of the experience, you will have a practical grounding in theatre and have mastered acting and improvisation techniques in order to create and put on a final 2-night performance at The Trinity Centre.

Trinity has hosted high-profile theatre performances including the Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart during MayFest 2012 and Beowulf – A Thousand Years of Baggage for this year's Mayfest event. Trinity has also developed other successful site-specific theatre performances including, At Tether's End by Nick Young and The Ithaca Axis by Nick Young and Dr Edson Burton.

If you're looking to get into acting but don't know how, or you're studying a theatre course and want to get some more practical experience, please get in touch 01179251200 / info@3ca.org.uk and send us your contact details for more info!

Trinity Community Arts is a registered charity (no 1144770) if you would like to support us in our work, text TRIN13 £5 to 70070 to donate to Trinity and make a difference today.

The Veolia Environmental Trust have awarded Trinity Community Arts Ltd a grant of £23,000 towards the creation of a new, safe, play area within the centre’s garden. The play area will be used by the many existing users of the centre. It is hoped that it will also attract more local families by creating a natural, fun, safe play area within an inner-city urban environment, where currently there is nothing similar this side of the M32. The project has also been supported by a £2,000 Community First grant awarded by the Easton and Lawrence Hill Neighbourhood Management Team.

The Trinity Centre provides a range of much-needed services and facilities. It provides a space for the whole community, including those who may face barriers to participation such as young people who have been disengaged from mainstream services, refugee communities, Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) communities and long-term unemployed and financially disadvantaged people.

The play area will use high quality, sustainable materials and will include environmentally-conscious features which will inspire and challenge children and young people. The project will form part of the wider Trinity Development Project funded by the Big Lottery Reaching Communities Buildings Fund, designed to improve and increase the centre’s overall provision to the community.

The Veolia Environmental Trust award grants to community and environmental projects through the Landfill Communities Fund. The grant was awarded by our Board at its recent quarterly meeting, where it awarded a total of £1.2m to 47 projects across the UK. Their projects team will now start the process of working with Trinity Community Arts to develop their final plans and get the project off the ground.

Centre Manager, Emma Harvey, said, “We are delighted that The Veolia Environmental Trust has awarded this grant and we are looking forward to the project getting underway. The centre’s garden is a rare green space in an inner-city locality and it is great that we can improve it to encourage wider use by the community.”

The Executive Director of The Veolia Environmental Trust, McNabb Laurie, added, “Projects like this one make a real difference to our communities and our Board awarded this grant on its merits. We will now start working with Trinity Community Arts to develop a project that will really benefit the community of Bristol.”

Trinity Community Arts is a registered charity (no 1144770) if you would like to support us in our work, text TRIN13 £5 to 70070 to donate to Trinity and make a difference today.

Over an eight-week programme of intensive activities, young people will get a taste of what it's like to work in the creative, digital and media industries, whilst also developing their own campaign about issues affecting their communities.

Young people aged 18-25 who live in the communities surrounding the Trinity Centre (east Bristol), Ujima Radio (St Paul's) and Knowle West Media Centre (Knowle West) were interviewed to take part in the programme, which aims to build better links between young people and the creative and media industries.

The project will provide a rich and rewarding skills-development and training programme, that aims to support young people to realise their creative potential. Participants will work with creative practitioners, curators, data experts, as well as their local communities, to explore how artistic creativity can support social activism, whilst learning practical, employable skills that are relevant to their chosen industry.

The nine young people who have been selected to take part in the new project will gain hands-on experience through activities including digital and new media, radio and film, market promotion, research and journalism. We aim to equip the young people with skills directly relevant to finding work in many different creative fields as well as get the chance to network with media professionals.

The project will run from 14 May with a final campaign launch event on Thursday 4th July at The Trinity Centre. Watch this space for project updates and news!

The Curating Activism project is a partnership project between IBM, KWMC, UjimaFM and Trinity Community Arts.

The programme of works, which commenced in March 2013, is a scheme of roof repair and masonry works that will help to secure the future fabric of the building.

English Heritage funding was used in 2009 to carry out a conditions survey of the former Holy Trinity Church. The survey identified perforations to the south aisle lead roof – a sign of underside lead-corrosion caused by moisture getting trapped between the roof leadwork and underside insulation.

The roof repair works scheme, totalling over £140,000 will be followed by a programme of development works funded by the Big Lottery Reaching Communities Buildings Fund. The scheme of development works include improvements to the external grounds, creation of a new daytime reception and installation of heating, a sprung wooden floor, lighting and drapes in the upstairs hall space to make it suitable for activities such as dance, fitness and performance, as well as weddings and parties. The work will help to create a second smaller hall space, suitable for IT classes, community meetings and smaller functions.

This period of change cannot happen without support. If you would like to organise your own fundraising activities for the Centre, visit: JustGiving.com/TrinityCommunityArts. You can also make a small, one-off donation via JustGiving Trinity Text Appeal 2013 text TRIN13 £5 to 70070 to donate to Trinity and make a difference today.

Roof repair works 2013, by Rhiannon Jones

Low are a glimmer of hope in the sunset of a dying culture. Their two decades of patiently aching songs have provided a constant reference point for integrity, meditative rage and tenderness. Song titles are brief, lyrics are sparsely elusive and profoundly allusive. Spirituality, disquiet, death, and the search for unity pour out of chord shifts, harmonies and melodies - unrecognised or not. Low are a lot more than minimalists. Their gracious performances invite deep involvement and their songs present brilliantly uncomfortable questions and precious few answers.

Tonight in Bristol their sound was deep and loud (especially in "Monkey" from The Great Destroyer). Steve Garrington's bass was almost cruel in its precision and resonance. Alan Sparhawk's guitars roared when they weren't whispering. He was in truculent communion with the universe, expressing his normal laconic wit in wordless gestures and physical moves. "For your boys in Dubai…" was his shrugged opening line, introducing the unsettling "Plastic Cup" from the new album. He is a very handsome man.

Mimi Parker sang her songs and harmonies as beautifully as only she can, repressing something that wasn't being said by giving nothing away. Sixteen songs and two encores were presented – and they were all magnificent. The Trinity audience were reverentially silent (and the last words of the last song "I Hear Goodnight" were whispered – but every bit as audible as the shrugs)

The new album "The Invisible Way" was threaded through some of the best know classics like "Canada" and "Walk Into The Sea". The new songs maintained the high quality and intensity that Low's admirers expect. Trinity's audience were spellbound throughout .

Hibronix, a project of David Blumberg, formerly of Yuck, opened the evening with three big pieces of slurred and slowed Sparklehorse-like drone , supported on two by sidemen Sparhawk and Garrington. ("my backing band", he quipped) . What a very good night it was.

Sam Saunders

Arts West Side, our satellite project on Old Market High Street is one year old! One of the key aims of the project was to create a sustainable café, supported by volunteer input, that could eventually offer paid work opportunities to volunteers as the project grows and develops. The ethos of the café is to provide healthy eating vegetarian/vegan options, which are in short supply in the local area, increase access to the Internet for the community by providing free wi-fi and computer terminals as well as offering an exhibition space for local artists and contributing to the ongoing regeneration of the Old Market area.

In order to help us better realise this vision, Trinity is now working in partnership with the Uprising Bakery, which provides vegetarian and vegan food and will start to work with local groups like the Trinity garden group to provide fresh seasonal veg locally sourced. Through this partnership, the Arts West Side project now has increased capacity to support and develop volunteer and participatory opportunities within the café space and is better placed to move towards creating real paid work for individuals as café footfall and catering enquiries increase.

In line with this, we are also developing a project and is seeking funding to provide a volunteer coordinator who is able to support other volunteers to develop and run regular activities, providing advice and support as well as access to small project budgets for volunteers to set up and deliver their own activities (for materials and flyers, for example). As part of the application, we will also seek some funding to cover workshops around the café led by the Uprising Bakery, as well as Food Hygiene certificates for core volunteers working in the café. Finally, the application will include a budget for a pair of laptops so that the café is better placed to offer free internet access to the local community.

The café will be open every day 11am-5pm and, if you are interested in volunteering, Ellie from the Uprising Bakery will be there to meet, greet and induct any new or existing volunteers. Jamell from Trinity is working to continue the coordination of a rotating Arts Exhibitions Programme, so please get in touch if you are a local artist interested in exhibiting work. Kate Marsden will be working to support any new or existing volunteers wishing to develop arts/community workshops (such as our 'stitch and b*tch' workshop, pictured right) and if you have any questions or for more information or to discuss how you want to be involved please contact westside@3ca.org.uk or join our Arts West Side Facebook group.

The Ithaca Axis - FAQs

What is the performance about?

The Ithaca Axis is a citywide site-specific performance, following the story of four central characters: Odysseus Penelope Telemachus and Cassandra

This is an incredible journey taking place through several, secret locations across Bristol.

Part theatre, part adventure, The Ithaca Axis is a modern reinvention of the Epic myth The Odyssey.

Where is the performance taking place?

The performance will stretch across several secret locations across the City and will start promptly at 7pm from THE POSEIDON STATUE - opposite Bristol Hippodrome, St Augustine's Parade, Bristol, BS1 4UZ

Show dates?

23rd-27th April & 30th Apr-5th May (no show Apr 28th & 29th)

How will the audience get about?

The audience will then journey by foot through Bristol city centre, visiting a number of locations. There is a large element of walking involved in the show so please contact us for advice if you are disabled, or unsure about your fitness level.

Is the performance wheelchair accessible?

The show is wheelchair accessible, by prior arrangement – please contact us to discuss access, or any other requirements.

Are there ID requirements or an age limit to enter the event?

This show is not recommended for persons under 12 years old.

What are my transport/parking options getting to the event?

We advise audience members to use paid parking in the local vicinity (BS1 4DH) or to arrive by foot. The end location is different to the finish and public transport options for your return are available.

Where can I purchase tickets?

TICKETS: £10 (£7 concessions) available from:www.bristolticketshop.co.uk and Eventbrite.

I want to buy a ticket on the night, what do I do?

It may be possible to buy a ticket from our steward at the Poseidon Statue on the night if we are not sold out.

Is there any parking available?

We do not provide any parking. The finale of the show is at The Trinty Centre, 1.5miles away from its originating point so you might want to factor this into your plans.

Is there a bar?

There is a bar at the finale location, The Trinity Centre. You will arrive there approx 2hrs after the start of the show.

What about if I want to go to the loo!

A toilet break can be arranged with your mobile steward.

Where can I contact the organiser with any questions?

Contact the project team directly via info@poseidonfoundation.co.uk or contact The Trinity Centre via info@3ca.org.uk/0117 935 1200

After sixteen months of workshops, events and competitions, the Bridges Project (funded by the Arts Council) has culminated in a theatrical show The Ithaca Axis - a bold retelling of Homer's The Odyssey.

The Ithaca Axis draws from ideas and themes developed during regular Thursday acting workshops, as well as from a series of art and dance workshops in held in summer 2012 and the Bridges Exhibition.

In keeping with the theme of the Bridges Project, it celebrates the links between Bristol's communities and imagines what would happen if these links were destroyed.

To read more about The Ithaca Axis and how it was turned from a dream to a realisation you can read here.

Pictures taken with Nick Young (Bridges Project Artistic Director) rehearsing with the professional and emerging community cast in the Trinity

main hall.

You can still volunteer with The Ithaca Axis here.

Book tickets for The Ithaca Axis here

The exhibition has been created from the ideas of the communities and organisations involved and curated by Place Making Director, Leighton de Burca. Leighton is part of the Old Market Community Association, a group of residents and traders seeking to make Old Market a better place for all.

The exhibition features locally developed plans from areas including Bedminster, Old Market, Stokes Croft, Redcliffe and more. Speaking about the exhibition, Leighton said;

"The aim is simple - to enable people to get involved in the planning of their city. You do not need to be an architect or a town planner. Planning our communities, high streets and cities should be done by the people."

Venue: 1^st Floor Exhibition Hall, Trinity Centre, Bristol, BS2 0NW Cost: Free Entry

Date: 25^th March – 25^th May 2013 Opening Times: 9am–5pm Monday–Friday. Click here for event details.

Throughout the year Trinity hosts an eclectic range of events from live touring bands and fantastic theatre performances to club nights and private parties. We work with a broad range of partners to ensure that the public and guests that attend have the best experience possible.

We are currently looking for a bright Marketing, Communications or Media Graduate to join the team as a volunteer and support us in developing our marketing strategy for all activities, assisting the team with all aspect of making sure that we reach the widest possible audience. If you know your way around social media, trends, advertising, print and media we would love to hear from you.

To find out more or check out other volunteer opportunities visit our 'Volunteer' page

Last year on 31 March we opened a second premises at 6 West Street, Old Market through Bristol City Council's Community Asset Transfer programme.

One year on, we've made great progress - Arts West Side has now been established as a community arts space, with a team of 15 volunteers helping to run the space and the café, open between 11am-4pm Tues-Fri. We have delivered activities including arts workshops, exhibitions of local artists' work, music events and language exchanges. Our volunteers have been actively involved in the running of events and workshops, and have benefited from getting recognised certificates, skills and experience which has helped them to build confidence and gain work.

This year we will be running volunteer meetings on the 3rd Thursday of every month at 4pm so anyone looking to get involved are welcome. We have a new café manager from 'The Uprising Bakery' - a producer of local, fair-trade, organic, healthy food - and aim to offer earlier opening hours, foody workshops, volunteer training and a new menu - Yummy!

Volunteers will be running regular activities including; free open-mic nights on the 2nd and 4th Weds of each month (donations collected); a monthly Arts Exhibitions Programme of local artists' work; drop-in knitting sessions on Saturday mornings; reading workshop 'Everyday Reads' with Sound Reads and Ujima Radio; language exchanges; 'Anything Words' creative workshops involving poetry, prose, textiles and sculpture. Local artist Cedar will also be running a term of workshops as of February, every Tuesday for a 6-week term. For more information please contact westside@3ca.org.uk - so what are you waiting for? Come and get involved!

With the initial planning and art-workshop phases over the Bridges project has moved into delivering the final show The Ithaca Axis. The show will involve a dramatic re-interpretation of the classic Greek legend The Odyssey with the ancient kingdom of Ithaca replaced by modern day Bristol. Odysseus himself will be the corporate head of a Merchant Venturers style organisation. It will be an immersive promenade performance that takes it's audience on a journey through the streets of Bristol telling the story of our city through the prism of the myth.

The first step involved recruiting four professional actors for the main roles. With over 200 applications for the roles, it gave us a positive launch to the production (although also gave us quite a task shortlisting!).

The Bridges team was left with some very tough calls as they narrowed down from around 30 actors that made it to the second stage of auditions. Each actor displayed exceptional consummate craftsmanship, presence and imagination (see their pictures below).

After the elimination process, the production promises to be one of the theatrical events of the year encompassing the city centre and many key landmarks of Bristol past and present. But despite the successful auditions work is only just beginning. We are looking to recruit more performers for roles in the supporting ensemble cast. Although these roles are not paid they present a fantastic opportunity for experienced performers wanting to be part of a ground-breaking show through to people wanting to just give it a go. Director Nick Young says "This is a great route in for anyone interested in working alongside professional performers, writers and artists of the highest calibre on a project that will explore Bristol and its stories in a new and unique way."

If you find the idea of performing a little daunting then there are plenty of opportunities to join the production team in a range of roles from stage managers to marketing assistants. Just ask for more details!

For more information on any of the above opportunities please email bridges@3ca.org.uk or call 0117 935 1200.

I might have been the only person in the sold-out venue with no previous interest in the work of Conor O'Brien and his band. His recordings are good, but they suffer more than most from a lack of physical presence. The perfection of the albums do no justice, it seemed to me, to O'Brien's electrifying impact as an artist. His intimate, finely detailed vocal style and the extravagantly erotic/romantic poetry work so well on a stage because, in person, he so obviously means it all and makes such an effort to make sure each word and every nuance is clearly heard and emotionally absorbed. In "On A Sunlit Stage" at the beginning of the set he made this perfectly clear: "…every hidden part will be on display in a Carnival on a sunlit stage" he sang, with the t of "part" elaborately tongued and ostentatiously revealed. "Pay close attention", he seemed to be saying. "pay close attention, because I really mean all this ." That's when he got me.

His two albums should not be enough to support 90 minutes of such intensity. But there was no padding at all. Every song had its opportunity to shine. There were no duds. The band were fearsomely perfect. From the addition of a single harmony vocal on O'Brien's solo opening to a huge band roar for the finale and encore section they shaped a huge space and left the voice, delicate, enticing and fragile as clear as a bell.

Outstanding songs included "In Newfoundland Land You Are Free", "My Lighthouse" and "The Meaning Of the Ritual", but the huge achievement of tonight's show was the fierce unity of artists, audience and art. Trinity at its very best.

Support trio Stealing Sheep's distinctive harmonies and instrumentation were well received by the big crowd.

By Sam Saunders

As part of the Bridges Project funded by the Arts Council, Trinity ran a short-story competition around the project's theme 'bridges'. People were allowed to interpret the theme however they chose and the stories' texts and excerpts will be used to shape the dialogue and story of the project's final show 'Ithica' (details to be announced soon).

We were incredibly pleased with the turn-out - receiving a great deal more entries than we expected.

The closing event of the Bridges short story competition saw all of the authors who entered exchange opinions, tips and tricks, as each discussed their own unique take on the theme.

The judges (Bridges Project Coordinator Dr Edson Burton and award-winning authors Taniah Hershman & Mike Manson) had a difficult time picking through the vastly different styles of writing and individual takes on the theme. Finally able to reduce it to the top 3 stories the judges were still not satisfied, choosing to also commend three more stories that they felt deserved an honourable mention.

The competition results were as follows:

1. First place: Like a Bridge over troubled Waters - A Tale of Two Clichés (Mal Sainsbury)

2. Second place: Interconnectivity (David Chedgy)

3. Third place: Guerilla Knitting (Jude Higgins)

Commended:

• The Quiet DJ (Lynn Hunt)
• I Remember You Well... (Manu Emmanuel)
• An Almost Invisible Crack (Adriana Dorsett)

Runners Up:

• Some Scenes from a Bridge into Adulthood (Maureen Andrews)
• A Bridge Too Far (Anna Rosenburg)
• Bristol and Beyond (Jane Mccallum)
• Bridges (Wendy Murphy)
• Chalking Circles Bowlingreen (Malcolm Hamilton)
• Crossing that Bridge (Bahar Syed)
• First Steps (Edith Anderson)
• Marley (Taban Yassan)
• Me and My Best Friend (Alicia Quinn)
• Reaching for the stars (Alex Rankin)
• Suspended Animation (Jane Duffus)
• The Bridge to Humanity (Andrea)
• The Current (James Dyer)
• Crossings (Madalin Durell)
• Nubian Soul Bridge (Tim Goodman)

Trinity Community Arts (TCA) is off to a great start for 2013. With a recently awarded a grant towards building works to improve access to the Trinity Centre from the Big Lottery Reaching Communities Buildings Fund, the Centre has also been awarded funding from English Heritage, Biffa Award and The Pilgrim Trust to carry out a scheme of roof repair and masonry works that will help to secure the future fabric of the building.

English Heritage funding was used in 2009 to carry out a conditions survey of the former Holy Trinity Church. The survey identified perforations to the south aisle lead roof – a sign of underside lead-corrosion caused by moisture getting trapped between the roof lead work and underside insulation.

Following on from this, English Heritage supported the delivery of a feasibility study to look at options for development of the Centre to help increase usable space within the building. This led to further development works funded by Big Lottery Reaching Communities Buildings Fund and, as a result, a scheme of works has been developed – the first phase of which will be carried out this year thanks to Lottery funding.

Emma Harvey, Centre Manager said; “The building is 180 years old and is in seemingly good shape, however the failing leadworks is an issue that, if not addressed, could place the fabric of the building and its continued use in jeopardy. Lots of people care passionately about the Trinity Centre, and as a team we're working hard to make sure that past and present ambitions for the space are realised and she is here for another 180 years.”

Bristol City Council have recently granted TCA a 35-year lease through their Community Asset Transfer Policy, which has enable the charity to attract larger funding for capital works. A revenue grant of £15,000 Garfield Weston will help support the organisation this year as they deliver these challenging capital projects. TCA was also recently awarded the VISIBLE accreditation certificate by Community Matters in recognition of their service to the community.

Cath Hare, Programme Manager at Biffa Award, said: “Biffa Award is pleased to support this project to carry out essential repairs at the Trinity Centre. The work will allow more people to come together and use the building for a variety of activities, fulfilling its potential as a real community hub for future generations.”

The roof repair works scheme, totalling over £140,000 are scheduled to commence in March, while development works will begin in June and be phased in order to ensure that the Centre remains open throughout. The scheme of development works include improvements to the external grounds, creation of a new daytime reception and installation of heating, a sprung wooden floor, lighting and drapes in the upstairs hall space to make it suitable for activities such as dance, fitness and performance, as well as weddings and parties. The work will help to create a second smaller hall space, suitable for IT classes, community meetings and smaller functions.

Speaking about the recently awarded Big Lottery grant, Councillor Simon Cook, Cabinet Member for Culture and Sport, said: "Trinity is a stunning local landmark, and a beautiful space, but with a legacy of high maintenance and difficult problems typical of very old and beautiful churches. Everyone involved has shown remarkable creativity in conceiving new uses and activities."

This period of change cannot happen without support. If you would like to organise your own fundraising activities for the Centre, visit: JustGiving.com/TrinityCommunityArts. You can also make a small, one-off donation via JustGiving Trinity Text Appeal 2013 text TRIN13 £5 to 70070 to donate to Trinity and make a difference today.

accompanying image by Said Toliss

If you’ve ever been to a roller disco before you’ll know that it’s not all neon socks, lycra and cheesy 80s music. Okay it is that. But it’s also a great opportunity to let go of your inhibitions and really have a laugh.

After putting on some bright white roller skates and making a rather shaky entrance to the dance floor I clutched my friend and suddenly felt very thankful to have someone to hold on to. Instead of making a bee-line for the bar, (my usual course of action upon arriving at a club) I made a bee line for the make-shift neon hand-rails. The ground was quite literally moving beneath me and I could do one of two things. 1) Panic. 2) Accept that I was probably going to make an idiot of myself - but that sometimes that is hella fun. I chose option two.

I threw myself into the mass of skaters giggling and whizzing around the floor. On more than one occasion people fell down taking their friends with them into a hysterical heap on the floor, but everyone got up again and helped each other round. Some people really went wild throwing some shapes on the floor. I was never going to be this good. As I hurtled screaming into a man wearing leopard print I expected him to be catty, but he was really friendly and just helped me to find my wheels. Once I got the hang of it it was pretty exhilarating and even when I was scared everyone was so helpful and friendly.

If you’re bored of spending your Saturday nights in a commercial club or the cinema, or if you’re a bit of an adrenaline junky, or even just an 80s enthusiast then BUMP is definitely something to try, even just for a good old-fashioned laugh!

The BUMP crew are next at Trinity on Saturday 9^th February, more info here: http://bumpclub.co.uk/events.asp

By Tara Evans