Further to yesterday’s updates, firstly a message from our new Chairman, Paul Evans:

“I should like to thank our retiring Chairman Alan Pumfrey and secretary Jack Ward for their hard work and determination that has brought us to where we are now, poised to go ahead with conversion of the Legion Scotland undercroft to be our own Men’s Shed.  We aim to have Phase 1 (the garage bay conversion) operational by this autumn, and Phase 2 (the undercroft open area) by Spring 2019.  I know that the Shed will grow to be a valued and popular feature of Banchory.  I look forward to our Shed becoming the Go-To place for good causes needing skilled practical support from men enjoying working ‘shoulder to shoulder’.”

Alan P, our old Chairman, has also recently built a useful and informative model of the planned Shed premises which is much easier to understand than complex drawings.

(The photo can be seen at full size by clicking it)

You can see the Social area to the left (Phase 2 as mentioned by Paul above), and the workshop (Phase 1) to the right, being the two rooms with the paper labels internally.  The corridor behind and to the left is the fire escape from the Legion stairs and the unlabelled space to the right holds the existing Legion garages.  For cost-saving reasons, there is initially no door directly between the Social Area and the Workshop, and initially the window between them (which must be fire-safe) may also be deferred.  However, access between the two halves is possible on the flat (for accessibility) via the external doors, and also internally by doors out-and-back-in at the rear.

This is a fantastic model from Alan and really helps to crystallise what the Banchory Shed will look like.

We’ll post soon some information on where things have got to quote and funding-wise