BYC January Update
Last updated 13/01/2025
We’ve got an exciting year ahead at BYC. The building work continues on Edward Street and the team are busy making plans for the return to our new-and-improved home. The building remains on schedule to reopen in late August of this year.
When we began this project, we invited over 70 young people to an initial workshop with partners and staff to find out how the new design could maximise their use of the space and build on their existing sense of ownership. We shared these views with the architects and have incorporated the outcomes into the building plans. Those we spoke with wanted to see a more accessible and environmentally-friendly BYC, offering more services, including pathways to employability, wellbeing and health.
Throughout the rebuild, our regular activities continue to take place at our temporary Gloucester Road location. Weekly youth club sessions begin again on Tuesday 14 January and we’re excited to welcome everyone back.
We’ll also be launching our temporary indoor skatepark in Hove over the coming weeks. The new space will tide us over until we can return to our skatepark at Edward Street. Opening date for the Hove space will be shared on our BYC Skate Instagram when we’re ready to welcome you in!
BYC Building Update
Last updated 12/12/2024
There’s been a lot of progress happening over at Edward Street, as the steel structure of the new BYC is now complete! The original building’s new roof is planned to be in place by Christmas 2024.
It’s a very exciting moment for BYC, after a long time in planning and some obstacles along the way, you can now start to see the shape of our exciting new home. We’ve reached a significant milestone as the building takes shape, and we can start to see the new spaces emerge. Our building development is important for the whole city, including the thousands of young people that will use our centre, alongside the youth team, volunteers and the many other partner projects that we work with.
Huge thanks are due to our funders, ALTER and Sunninghill Construction, and all the young people whose ideas are at the heart of our new youth centre’s design.
As we look forward to our building’s completion, we have another roller-coaster journey ahead to fundraise for everything else we need to make our dream youth centre come to life, including furniture, decorations and equipment that will make our dream space a reality for the young people of our city.
If you want to receive more regular updates on our building project, and news on all our youth work projects and activities, sign up for our monthly newsletter.
If you have the means to support us by making a donation, you can choose to support us with a regular or a one-off gift, and any amount is greatly appreciated. Thank you from all at BYC!
BYC on Tour
Last updated 04/12/2024
Throughout the rebuild on Edward Street, we have been on the road finding different venues for bands and acts to perform in. Brighton venues have included The Actors, Daltons, Ironworks Studios, Komedia and The Old Courthouse. Huge thanks are due to all the local venues for their support whilst we are without our own gig venue.
It has been a great experience for young bands to play at these venues and has confirmed why it is so important for youth centres to offer gig opportunities for young people, as well as spaces to rehearse and gain experience in playing to an audience. Even the most supportive commercial venues often cannot afford to have young bands play over weekends, and this is when venue space for young people is most needed. We look forward to the opening of the new BYC with an improved performance space so we can bridge that gap.
Whilst our own gig venue is closed, BYC has also been touring Youth Clubs around the UK to present a series of gigs. We’ve taken bands from BYC to perform at Gosforth Civic Theatre in Newcastle and The Chapel in Chichester. We will be heading to Hastings and Liverpool over the comings months.
On Saturday 30th November, two BYC bands went by coach for their third leg of their Youth Club tour. Bluebottles and Livid performed to a packed audience at Heatham House Youth Centre in Twickenham.
At BYC we believe that live performance is a key part of the programme both for the performers and the audience. The tour is an amazing opportunity to experience playing to different audiences across the country. We are also hoping to create a network of youth projects that support live performance.
Latest Building Update
Last updated 14/06/24
What’s going on with BYC?
Demolition of the site on Edward Street is well and truly underway. This is the start of a major redevelopment of the building, due to open on the same site in June 2025.
Our office and some of our youth activities have moved to 94 Gloucester Road. This is a smaller space and so we’re not able to offer as much as we’re used to but we’re slowly building our youth programme back up and welcome regular young members of BYC to join in. Call, email or contact Brighton Youth Centre on Instagram if you want info on what’s going on currently.
Above shows an early visual of the new plans for the building. Due to soaring costs the original plans sadly had to be reduced in size, but this new building still provides a huge update on what we had before.
The west side of the building is being demolished and replaced, with the entrance being moved onto the corner of Edward Street and an outdoor space created at the back. The east half of the building that the skatepark sits in is remaining and being refitted on the inside.
This will create a fully accessible youth centre with upgrades to all our existing facilities as well as new additions such as a cafe space, and counselling and GP rooms. On the top floor you can see the extension to the skatepark which will provide a larger seating area overlooking the city, toilets and extra amenities.
Our initial plans to provide a temporary skate facility in Brighton while all this was going on have proven much harder than they originally seemed due to lack of available spaces. But we are still looking and hope to provide somewhere throughout the winter months, should somewhere come up.
We’re extremely grateful to everyone who visits the centre over the years, and are sorry for the disruption. This work is essential to securing BYC’s long term future and allowing us to continue providing these services to young people in Brighton. We will of course keep you updated with any and all progress as we go through this change. Until then, if you didn’t hear it from us then feel free to ignore whatever it is.
We will continue to keep the public and service users regularly updated in this time of transition.
If you wish to contact us our contact information will remain constant:
Enquiries email: office@brightonyouthcentre.org.uk
Office phone number: 01273 681 368
Instagram – Brighton Youth Centre / BYC Skatepark
Supporting BYC as a charity
BYC is a charity that owns the building and runs sessions and activities. We receive a grant from the Council but we raise most of our income (over 80%) from renting space in the building and income from the skatepark. This means our income has been hit hard as a consequence of losing our building on Edward Street while redevelopment work takes place.
If you are able to support us at this time that would be appreciated. This could be a donation, a message of support or an offer of help.
If you want to donate you can do so below. If you’re booking a place in the skatepark you also have the option of making a donation alongside your booking.