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We’ve only gone and done it! We have built an amazing youth centre right slap bang in the middle of Llandudno.

We’ve always had a space. From 2009-2014 that was Reverb Youth Bar on Madoc St. It was brilliant, it was cool, it was state-of-the-art, it was like a Costa Coffee, but just for teenagers – but it was ultimately too small, too expensive, and with only one year lease extensions, ultimately too short term.

So, we packed up and moved to Ty Llywelyn Community Centre. This was a completely different beast, and a beast it was… it was enormous! it had multiple rooms, a couple of halls, an office, storage space, and even an outside football court. It was also right on the doorstep of Ysgol John Bright. We enjoyed six happy years there, but it also wasn’t perfect. We had to share the space with many other users, so it wasn’t really “ours”. This meant that every event and every project that we wanted to run needed a lot more set up in order to put our own stamp on it. It was hard work running projects when you knew that you were going to be there for hours beforehand and afterwards, just to make it work. So, during COVID we began our search for a new space.

At this point we want to give a big shout-out to Gloddaeth Church and the Presbyterian Church of Wales. They have made it possible for us to create a brand new, bespoke youth centre. We have taken over the halls adjacent to Gloddaeth Church. This used to be a mechanic’s garage, and once upon a time it was Llandudno’s firehouse, when the fire engines of the day were horse and cart. Our office now is in the old hayloft!

So, what is it and what have we done?

For the last ten months we have worked incredibly hard to make a professional-quality space for young people. It has a small stage with guitars and a sound system. It has three different seating bars, including one attached to a kitchen with hot chocolate machines. It has a large screen TV with computer games. There’s a pool table, table football, arcade machines, and the best hanging chair you’ve ever seen! There are bookcases full of boardgames, trolleys full of art supplies, and in case they weren’t sure – a giant neon sign that says “You Are Welcome.”

Upstairs we have built an office, a small group area, and a place for team to hang out. We’re now in the process of converting the second large upstairs room into a mixture of storage and creative space, including hot-desk homework zones.

We’ve worked really hard to make sure it doesn’t look like just another run-down hall. Everything has been finished very well, using high quality materials that should last for years.

To be perfectly honest, it’s not totally finished yet. We’ve just replaced all the lights and we have begun to have some pilot youth groups to test it, but it’s still going to take a few more months before we’re satisfied that it’s totally ready to roll.

Check out these photos cataloguing some of the journey – and scroll down to see the ‘nearly finished’ product!

Let’s just say this has been a huge undertaking and we are so grateful for all the support we’ve had. We’ve had incredible volunteers and donors supporting this work – that said, now the hard work really begins.

As I hope you can tell, we have tried to do this right. We want to provide young people with the best resource we possibly can. We don’t want to create just another hall with peeling paint, and some broken down games. We want young people to feel so blessed by this space!

Earlier in the year I travelled to London to visit some of the best youth centres in the UK. I was blown away by what I learned. There is so much opportunity for us to do this well!

So, here’s my direct appeal: Please consider becoming one of our monthly donors. To create and run this centre well and seize the opportunity with both hands, we really do need to raise another £350 a month. Could you become one of our monthly partners? If 35 more people were to give £10 a month (a cup of coffee a week!), then we’d be there! Could you help us out?

Also, linked to this, is a slightly cheekier direct appeal to churches. Please consider making Youth for Christ one of your missionary giving partners. We want Youth for Christ to be fully invested in by the local community. We are very grateful for the support we get from local churches, but like many of these organisations most of our support comes from very few sources. Help us spread the load by becoming part of this journey. At your next eldership meeting, consider asking the question whether your church could budget some financial support for Youth for Christ to help us connect young people of Jesus in this area. That would be amazing!

Now – check out the photos!

 

 

Check out the video:

So, what’s the story?

 

Yup. You read that right! We’re on the move. Over the last thirteen years we have had two centres of operation. The first was the amazing Reverb Youth Bar on Madoc St. It was an absolutely stellar venue! State of the art, bespoke, cosy, fun, and we built some amazing memories there and did some truly wonderful gospel ministry.

Since 2015 we’ve been using Ty Llywelyn Community Centre. This was also brilliant! Huge spaces, lots of opportunities for new types of projects, and really easy to get to from Ysgol John Bright.

Both of these venues were amazing, but both had their drawbacks too. Reverb was awesome, but it was on a difficult street for late night youth work (so many conversations with upset neighbours!), and it was just too small. Ty Llywelyn fixed both of these problems, but because it wasn’t ‘our’ space, we couldn’t customise it to our work. This meant it took far too long to set up for and pack away everything we did.

Imagine then – what if we could have a building in the middle of town, close to all the action, big enough for a variety of projects, and ‘ours enough’ to deck out exactly the way we want. Wouldn’t that be amazing?

So, with great trust and openness from Gloddaeth Church and the Presbyterian Church of Wales, we’re excited to announce that are going to move into the building adjacent to theirs known as ‘The Garage’.

This is a two-story building which we are planning to turn into a fully functional, high-quality Youth Centre – something completely unique in North Wales. It has a large downstairs room with a kitchen and toilets, and two smaller rooms upstairs for an office and small group space.

Not only is this an ideal building and great location, but it puts us closer to the Christian community in town. Our projects have always felt a little distant from churches, so being able to be so close is a huge boon for us! We want to dial up our work across churches. We want to make a big deal of this in the years to come and work more clos with the local church scene. Your pastors have already heard from us this year, and soon you’ll be getting a pamphlet on how Youth for Christ could serve you better.

So, what are we going to do with this new space? Well, quite a lot. We will be repainting, refurbishing, and refurnishing. Bringing in some quality technology and facilities and trying to create a space that truly serves communities of young people. I say communities, because rather than just running big drop-in sessions, instead we are going to try and focus on deeper relationships with smaller and more intentional groups of young people. I think that’s going to have a much longer lasting impact!

We’re excited about this – but also a little scared. We want to be good stewards of all that God has given us, so we don’t want to have bitten off more than we can chew. However we believe God has clearly laid this path out before us, so we’re going to walk it.

We really need you’re help for this! We need you to pray, but we also need practical help. There is a lot of moving, painting, tiling, trips to the tip, more painting, wiring, cleaning, and more painting to do! Could you help us?

Finally, this is a long-term project so we’re looking for long term support. I want to ask you quite boldly, could you give a little to us each month? We’ve had some truly incredible one-off financial gifts which are going to help us do the work on the building, but what we need now is regular support. We need to know what money is coming in each month so we can plan our projects with wisdom and security. We really need to raise another £500 per month. That’s 50 people giving £10 each month – or a cup of coffee a week. Please consider, could you be one of these supporters?

Today we have a ‘full-circle story’ from Sophie Spree. As with all of our full-circle stories, it follows a journey of a young person we have worked with – who grew up! We miss Sophie to bits here in Llandudno but are blown away by what God’s been doing with her. Read it in her own words…

My name is Sophie, I started being part of Llandudno Youth for Christ when I was about eleven years old, and somehow that is already ten years ago!

These days I live and work in the West Midlands. I have two part time jobs, both of which are semi-technical, so I’ll try and explain them simply. Three days a week I work for my church as a communications and logistics worker which includes ensuring necessary communications happen, assisting in the running of the building, and overseeing our digital media volunteers from Youth for Christ. On my other two days a week I am a videographer at Youth for Christ’s national office in Halesowen and this means contributing to their media output which supports all areas of the mission. I’m working within the communications department but serving all the team at Youth for Christ across the departments.

The story of how these came about is quite amazing, and that’s what I’d like to tell you about now.

As a teenager I developed an interest in film and that area of media but I didn’t really want to study it full time like most people in that industry do. However, I did do a part time Essential Technical Film Skills course at college. Not long after I had finished the course I remember Tim having a chat with me at youth one night and asking if I’d considered doing any Christian gap years in media as he knew of two that existed. At this point I went away and did some research into them both. Once I had started this process I got quite excited about the idea of leaving my job in retail and going elsewhere to learn more about working with cameras and filming in Christian environments, and so I also started thinking about people I knew at different charities where I might be able to volunteer on a short term basis if neither of the gap years worked out.

Turns out you don’t need to start making plans B and C when God has a plan A! I had an interview for each gap year and afterwards I remember telling God He needed to make it really clear to me what He wanted me to do next because I had no idea which gap year I preferred over the other. And make it clear He certainly did, as one offered me a place and the other said they didn’t think I was right for their programme that year.

At this point I might as well drop the name in in case you hadn’t already guessed. I started a gap year in media and youthwork with Youth for Christ in September 2019. Due to covid gaining speed across the world our placements came to an end in March 2020 and we were all sent back to our original homes. This was hard to deal with at the time. In hindsight if that hadn’t happened then I would be very unlikely to have applied to do a second year. The story continues that that is what happened and in July 2021 I finished my second year in digital media with Youth for Christ and my church.

During this time I started to wonder what would be next, it felt like whatever it was would have to be in the Llandudno/North Wales area or around the West Midlands as I didn’t feel ready to start over again somewhere new.

To tell it briefly, I applied for a job that I didn’t get due to not being passionate enough for it, and then I got offered two other jobs instead; one from my church and one from Youth for Christ. This was amazing because both of these places have sown a lot into me during my two gap years.

I can fairly confidently say that none of this would have happened if it hadn’t been for the time I spent as a young person at Llandudno Youth for Christ and for the investment I received from the team there. I am a different person to who I was ten years ago when I first got involved, I am even different to who I was starting out on The Year Out two years ago. I am so grateful for everything I have gained from my time at Youth for Christ, both in Llandudno and at National.

If you want to keep up with some of what I’m doing you can sign up to my email newsletters here https://www.yfc.co.uk/sophiespree