Reopening the Old School | Yr Hen Ysgol

Black Mountains College celebrated the opening of the old school building in Talgarth on Friday 27th February.

The former primary School and Youth Centre had been derelict since 2010. A community asset transfer from Powys County Council, underpinned a bid for retrofit funding from the levelling up department of the former conservative government. This was matched by a grant from the Garfield Western foundation and Powys County Council transforming towns fund. The cutting edge retrofit incorporating hemp blocks, wool insulation and underfloor heating powered by a heat pump was designed by Featherstone Young architects and carried out by Jenkinson’s Builders. 

The new building is the hub for Black Mountains College operations in Talgarth, including teaching their future skills suite of diplomas, in partnership with NPTC Group, and their BA(hons) Sustainable Futures: Arts, Ecology and Systems Change undergraduate program, taught in partnership with Cardiff Metropolitan University. The event was also the fifth birthday of the college which has now been teaching for five years and Talgarth and in Treherbert RCT. The building features are library open to the public from 9 to 5, five days a week, with a wide range of books on a topic of sustainability. 

The building was opened by the leader of Powys CC, Jake Berriman with speeches from local county councillor  William Powell and Ben Rawlence,  the Chief Executive of the college.