£250k grant will create community spaces at new hospital
A £250,000 grant from The National Lottery Heritage Fund will go towards restoring 100-year-old stained glass windows from a former Birmingham hospital’s mortuary.
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The windows, originally at City Hospital, will be relocated to the Winter Gardens at the Midland Metropolitan University Hospital, in Smethwick.
Money raised by National Lottery players will also pay for activities within The Commons, a community-designed and built living nature installation at the new hospital, which was opened by Sandwell and West Birmingham NHS Trust in October last year.
And it will fund two other projects – an audio trail which will involve patients, staff and the community gathering and recording their memories around the history of City Hospital and a TV treasure trove of memories in film format of the hospital which will be shown in the People’s Gallery at the Midland Met.
Sandra Taylor, Senior Arts and Heritage Manager for Your City & Metropolitan Hospitals Charity, the Trust’s charitable arm, which secured the Heritage Fund grant, said: “These projects will enable us to explore and celebrate the history of our hospital, whilst also restoring windows which are of historical significance and displaying them to share their beauty.
Sandra added: “The Commons Garden will be a two-year programme of activity, whilst the audio trail will play recordings in specific locations around the Midland Met. Users will be able to unlock them by scanning QR codes.
“Patients, staff and our community will be able to take part in the projects through events and training opportunities, creating a real community feel at our new hospital, which has always been the charity’s main focus.
“National Lottery players’ support will help to capture memories of City Hospital which has been part of Birmingham for more 130 years.”
Johnny Shah, Director of Your City & Metropolitan Hospitals Charity, added: “We’d like to say a big thank you to The National Lottery Heritage Fund for their support of these fantastic projects, which will hugely help our charity work towards achieving our main purpose of enhancing the experience of everyone using our healthcare services.
“The video display within the People’s Gallery at Midland Met will add further value. This was only possible thanks to a charitable grant from Arts Council England, as part of our successful We Are Metropolitan fundraising campaign.”
“However, this is just the start of our journey, as we need further support to sustain this work and do even more to help improve life chances in our communities.”
