Former Shades building in Hartlepool set for £60,000 repair work as council looks into potential microbrewery and training centre plan

Hartlepool Borough Council chiefs had previously approved for £60,000 to be spent to fund emergency repair work to 16 Church Street (formerly ‘Shades’), money which came from an underspend in the council’s compensation grant scheme for businesses in Church Street.

This came after the council purchased the building in July 2018, with help from the Tees Valley Combined Authority.

Denise McGuckin, council director of regeneration and neighbourhoods, said they are now working on a Heritage Lottery funding application to bring the site back into use.

She also told the Neighbourhood Services Committee they are possibly looking at a microbrewery along with a training centre for the site, although work and talks are ongoing.

She said: “We’ve got a Heritage Lottery Fund application that has gone through the first stage and we’ve been asked to do more work.

“While we’re doing those studies, the building is deteriorating, daily, and we need to do those emergency works to prevent it deteriorating further.

“What will happen is we need an end operator or an occupier.

“What we are looking at is possible a microbrewery type pub, with training upstairs working with a college, and we know there are some local businesses who are interested.

“Be assured we know this building needs significant funding and the local authority cannot afford to do it and therefore needs Heritage Lottery funding.

“It’s a journey you go on and you have to make sure you are preventing further deterioration as well, and the £60,000 will go some way to do that.”

She also added there was ‘no intention’ of selling the site on.

Coun John Tennant, chair of the Neighbourhood Services Committee, said the council has a responsibility to protect buildings such as Shades.

He said: “Regarding the whole Church Street renovation, we can’t really let buildings like Shades go into disrepair and disuse, we as an authority do have a responsibility to up keep them.”

The Shades opened in 1856 and closed in 1970, re-opening briefly as the New Shades.