- Re-opening from Monday 19 April and planned stages
- Our Reach Out Projects
- Improvements to the House
- Sculpture Commission Opportunity
- Summer Garden Activities
- Staff, Governance, Money and Resilience
1. We are SO excited to be re-opening Mycenae House from Monday 19 April 2021
We are really looking forward to welcoming everyone back to the house over the coming weeks, until the point where there are no Covid-19 restrictions and we all have the freedom to do those wonderful and enriching things that we may have taken for granted pre-pandemic.
In line with the Government 4 Step Roadmap and in response to our users and community needs, what follows is Timetable for Reopening Mycenae House :-
STAGE 2 – Monday 19th April until at least Monday 17th May 2021
Opening times:
Monday to Friday – 9am -til 1pm & 3.30pm til 7.30pm
Saturday – 9am til 5pm
Please note we will not be open during the evenings.
Permitted activities – Children’s activities (up to 15 parents/carers) plus One to One Therapy Sessions .
The office will also be staffed on weekday mornings from 19th April.
STAGE 3 – Monday 17 May at the earliest we will be allowed to invite all groups and users back into the house including evening activities, fitness & well-being activities and some small scale social activities. The confirmation on the lifting of our own restrictions will coincide with the Government’s announcement on lifting its national restrictions
STAGE 4 – From Monday 21 June 2021.
All remaining restrictions should be lifted and at this point all of our normal activities will fully resume, including concerts, wedding receptions and parties. Again all subject to confirmation by the government.
Talk To Us
You know we are only too pleased to welcome you back and we encourage you to speak to us early, to talk things through and explore all angles and issues. Contact details are info@mycenaehouse.co.uk, 020 8858 1749, www.mycenaehouse.co.uk.
Our Continued Commitment to Your Covid-19 Security – for all visitors, users and our staff. We will continue to adhere to the guidelines including 2m distancing, wearing face masks, handwashing and other additional safeguarding measures for your safety.
2. Reach Out Project is Back Up and Running
Our award winning social inclusion project has a huge programme of activities and events to support those that are socially isolated and suffer poor physical and mental health and loneliness in our community. From May 17 the senior citizens drop-in cafe and digital inclusion workshops will resume. They will be limited in numbers to start with but we are excited to once again serve our wider community.
We have launched a fundraising programme to support Reach Out, which had previously been self-funded from any surplus made from running Mycenae House. Due to the year long Covid-19 pandemic our earned income has dropped by 87%, so until we rebuild our business model we will need to find external funding to support this work. Donations can be made here: https://gofund.me/2e283eef, please feel free to share this link.
3. You’ll Soon See How Busy We’ve Been!
Our volunteers and staff have been tirelessly working away to improve and maintain the House, particularly since January, which has included lots of painting, plastering, a brand new floor in the main hall, installation of new digital signage, a new digital workshop space, creating a new web site, new lighting and curtains, and we have installed lots of framed pictures of local interests in many of the rooms. We hope you notice the difference.
4. Commissioning Sculpture for Mycenae House
As a result of a very generous family legacy gift we have set about commissioning two sculptures to be sited in architectural coves at the front and rear of the building. The coves have lain empty since 1964 and we are delighted to open this opportunity up to local three-dimensional artists to create unique artworks. The commission is open to proposals from artists until the 21st June when a panel of three people will choose from all of the entries. More information is available from https://mycenaehouse.co.uk/2021/03/23/artist-commission/
The arts have also played a massive part in the lives of our people in the last year so it is wonderful to report that despite being closed, our exhibition of drawings by Isobel Kimberely went ahead at Mycenae House and via many many digital viewings, Isobel managed to sell all of the exhibited pictures. It was a stunning show and very rewarding to help in her success. We can also report that another artist we work closely with, Lesley Hall has been an award winner several times over since the pandemic started. Lesley teaches and leads several art classes at Mycenae every week and is a mighty fine draught woman, painter, photographer and jeweller.
5. Summer Garden Activities
As a plan to help our communities re-engage with one another and with us at Mycenae House we are planning a series of cultural afternoon events in the garden across the summer. It is a plan that we are just working on now but to give you a glimpse we are planning 3 live music picnics with Jazz, Classical and Folk and World Music, we are also planning three live events centred around dance and theatre and a family activities event. All will be free but will be ticketed and limited to 100 people each event.
6. Staff, Governance, Money and Resilience
We have retained all of our staff (doffing cap to the Furlough system), who mainly appear to be in rude health and are keen to get back to serving our communities. Our board of trustees remain supportive and resolute. We will be looking for new trustees to support and re-energise the organisation as we plot a new future so please do let us know if you are someone or know someone who could bring positive skills, experience and ideas to help us going forward. Financially the pandemic has hit all organisations hard and we are no exception (with income down 87% and costs only marginally lower than normal), however we remain resilient and financially strong thanks to our financial reserve policy and to the generosity of the furlough system and the Royal Borough of Greenwich council’s support for the Voluntary sector.
Congrats and Good luck to our staff and friends – The lockdown has obviously been long and provided more personal time so it comes as no surprise to report that three people we know and work very closely with have become pregnant and are about to have new babies. We can’t wait to meet our new little friends!