Telephone exchange renovation for church to grow

2 hours ago

Richard PriceWest Midlands

News image — Luke Baldwin says renovating the former telephone exchange in Hanley will enable Presence Church to boost capacity

BBC A man with brown hair and a short beard is wearing a white hoodie. He is standing in a room which appears to be mid-way through a renovation project. He is smiling for the camera. — Luke Baldwin says renovating the former telephone exchange in Hanley will enable Presence Church to boost capacity

The leader of a church which launched less than four years ago said rapid growth meant they now needed to further increase capacity.

Luke Baldwin, a senior leader at Presence Church in Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent, said they had achieved about a third of their £150,000 target in four months towards renovations.

The church is now based on Trinity Street, in the telephone exchange which has also previously seen a life as various bars and restaurants including Fat Cats, The Exchange and The Werkroom.

"We just knew in order to grow we'd need our own space so that we can grow even further," Baldwin said.

The church began in October 2022 as monthly worship events known as Presence Nights held at the YMCA in Hanley.

It follows Christianity but is not affiliated with a specific branch of the religion.

The back of a coffee bar serving area, with bottles of flavoured syrups and a clock as well as coffee machines and cups. There is metal lettering on the wall which reads "Presence". — Presence Church has been based on Trinity street in Hanley since early 2024

They started out in the building's basement, he said, but now the plan was to transform the upper floors into a space for religious services.

"It'll look like the old school Wesleyan chapels that you see in the villages," Baldwin said, "but it'll be a whole stage and huge LCD screen – top tech all the way through – seating, nice lighting. It'll just look like it's been purpose-built."

The aim was to have capacity for about 200 people, he added, with existing spaces in the building as overflow space to bring total capacity to 400.

A stack of things including a door and a set of ladders, piled up in the middle of an otherwise empty room. There is a light attached to a wire strung across the centre of the room. The walls appear to have been stripped ready for decoration. — Renovation work on the upper floors of the building is due to be completed by mid-October, Baldwin said

While boosting capacity was the immediate priority, the future could see them move elsewhere if attendance continued to grow.

"We want to repurpose this as a resource centre for the city," he said.

"We already have things like home learning groups, so from all over the region home-educated kids come for lessons for maths and English and life skills with one of our teachers.

"We have a coffee shop that's open on a Wednesday where people can come in and get pastoral support.

"We would love to see that expand, we would love to see youth work start developing."

He said the ideal scenario was for them to find a plot of land and build a new facility from scratch.

"We know with Hanley it's been a deprived city centre for a while, we believe that that's going to start to upturn and we want to be a part of the story and do our part in seeing a building like this renovated and restored for the city."

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