Bristol Beacon has reopened: But what does the £130 million pound project look like?
The arduous project has not only tested the ability of construction teams, but also the purse strings at Bristol City Council with the total cost now at £132 million. Yet any fears the city’s public will not return to the venue, formerly known as Colston Hall, appear to be being eased as the venue hit 1 million pound in tickets sales ahead of its reopening.
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00:00 Love the Old Hall as I did. It was a little bit shabby to be honest and the backstage
00:09 facilities were not great. So we were never able to get those really big names. You know
00:16 those artists that would normally do an arena but sometimes like to do consoles, those shows
00:22 never came our way just because you know the facilities here were such that we couldn't
00:27 you know they wouldn't want to play here. But now we've got this incredible facility,
00:31 you know one of the best in the UK. I promise you you'll see some of those big names in
00:37 the not too distant future.
00:39 The arduous project has not only tested the ability of construction teams but also the
00:45 purse strings of Bristol City Council with the total cost now at £132m. Yet any fears
00:51 the city's public will not return to the venue formerly known as Colston Hall appear to be
00:56 eased as the venue hit a million pounds in ticket sales ahead of its reopening.
01:02 So we closed in 2018 to redevelop and it's taken us a bit longer than we had expected.
01:09 There was lots of stuff that we found that we didn't know was there. Old Elizabethan
01:13 wells, supporting walls that we thought were filled in and they weren't. And we felt it
01:20 really keenly that Bristol hasn't had their main music venue for five whole years. They've
01:25 been having to travel to Bath or Birmingham or Cardiff. So we're really happy that music
01:31 lovers in Bristol have access to their concert hall again. We've got a packed programme going
01:35 forward and people are coming through the doors which is amazing.
01:40 The venue will see acts such as Orchestral Season, Ricky Gervais and Jools Holland. But
01:45 what else can we expect? Let's find out.
01:49 It's a really broad church in terms of the programme. So we do everything from, you know,
01:55 we've got Beethoven to brass bands, we've got, you know, jazz, electronic music. We've
02:01 got all of our new spaces back. So we've got the big name artists in the main hall. We've
02:08 got our sort of art centre type programme in the lantern. We've got our new sort of
02:11 club space in the cellars. So there is something for everybody.
02:16 We knew that the name Colston Hall was putting people off from attending and we did a huge
02:21 process of consultation, talking to our audiences, thinking about what the organisation meant
02:26 to them and what the name could be. And the name Bristol Beacon for us really talks about
02:32 a welcome. It talks about warmth. It talks about light. It talks about us being a beacon
02:36 for music in Bristol, a space where people can come and feel welcome and be welcomed.
02:41 And we hope that that vibe carries across into the new venue too.
02:45 Only time will tell if the £132m renovation of the project was worth it for Bristolians
02:51 and those visiting the city. But for now, the venue's events are well underway to show
02:57 off their five-year development project.
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