Welcome to the Village Hall Website

Southbourne Village Hall The story so far.

Built in 1972, the hall was first thought of by a group of friends saving a penny a week, one of the leading lights of this campaign was a Mrs M Green, who in the 1950's with many others started a collection of 1 penny a week to fund a village hall. The fund was monitored by a thermometer type gauge where the chemist and dentist now stand.

Previously an orchard and where pigs and chickens were reared, eventually the hall was built, and on the 11 ^th of November 1972 the hall was opened by Mrs Green.

Built of pre-cast concrete of 9 inch thick, with the main roof, an unusual barrel vault design [to allow the sport of badminton] and ancillary areas a normal flat design. The hall has come through many stages in its life, during the nineties the hall was looking at extinction, but due to the hard work of its then chairman, Mr Barry Wood and the committee, who organised various activities, sponsored walks etc, the hall was saved.

In 1986 an extension was built onto the hall, again opened by Mrs Green, extension named after Mrs Monica Sutcliffe, the then Chairman.

Many organisations use the hall. Guides,Brownies,Rainbows,W.I., Emsworth Flowers and Dragon Ladies to name but a few. Also using the hall are two West Sussex N.H.S groups, a Baby Clinic and Children's Services. The hall can be used for weddings, parties, lectures and meetings.

The hall also has a fairly large stage, and very good size kitchen. There is also the Sutcliffe room, a good size and ideal for meetings and conferences.

In the last couple of years the hall has come on in leaps and bounds. Some of the improvements include a new disabled toilet and shower room, complete redecoration throughout, a new range oven, new centre lights and curtains replaced with new blinds, and there is more, we now have new furniture i.e. tables and chairs

Short term planning stage, the car park to be completely resurfaced.