History of the Centre
The Bromley by Bow Centre was established in 1984 after the Reverend Andrew Mawson came to this area as the Minister of the local United Reformed Church. He found a dwindling, elderly congregation, and recognised that if the Church was to survive it needed to adopt a different approach. He persuaded his congregation to open the building up to the local community. What they found was a community rich in culture and creativity. Local artists became involved, and agreed to teach their skills and encourage people to explore their own creativity in return for rent-free workshops.
The Church started a nursery, helping to meet the need for good quality childcare in Bromley by Bow. This helped set the pattern for the development of the Centre: responsive to the needs of the community, and using the buildings and facilities in imaginative and resourceful ways. The interior of the Church was redesigned to suit its many uses, with the old, formal lines of pews taken out and replaced with furniture that could be reconfigured as needed.
Another guiding principle that was established early on was the breaking down of barriers between people. The Church became used for all sorts of events, from Eid and May Day celebrations, Chinese New Year, Harvest Supper and others. As a result, the building became a focal point and meeting place for the entire community, laying the foundations for the Centre’s subsequent development.
As it grew beyond the Church, the Bromley by Bow Centre developed as a secular organisation in its own right, and became a registered charity in 1994. It then expanded rapidly, with the biggest change happening in 1997 with the opening of the Health Centre.
The entire site kept evolving, with new buildings added to existing ones and the park restored as an asset for the entire community. Along the way, the Bromley by Bow Centre kept innovating and experimenting, challenging conventions and confounding expectations.
It helped to define social enterprise before the term was in widespread use; it created an exemplar Healthy Living Centre; it pioneered an outreach model that brought local people out of isolation.
Today, the Bromley by Bow Centre is an organisation with a turnover of more than £3m a year and in excess of 100 staff. It is the third largest provider of adult education in the Borough of Tower Hamlets and has launched numerous spin-off businesses. Well known in London, the Centre has developed a growing national and international reputation, and today shares its expertise with people who want to improve their own communities.
Andrew was awarded an OBE in the Millenium Honours List for his work at the Centre, and in 2007 was made a life peer. In 2008 he published a book - The Social Entrepreneur: Making Communities Work, which chronicles the development of the Centre. An extract was published in the Guardian on 9 January 2008.
You can read two more extracts from the book in Stories.
