The newly opened South Wales Evening Post Theatre on Swansea’s High is hosting a run of Mal Pope’s acclaimed musical Cappuccino Girls from September 22 until Christmas.

The theatre’s opening is an exciting step forward for Swansea Creative Hub and marks a major milestone in the £25million Urban Village revamp of Swansea’s High Street.

Located on the ground floor of the Urban Village, the theatre offers visitors an intimate and totally unique experience. Lines between audience and performers are blurred with seating arranged to resemble café chairs and tables. The action will unfold around the audience, making them feel truly caught up in the story.

Billed as a mixture of Friends and Sex & The City, Cappucino Girls was first performed in Manchester in 2005, where the Manchester Evening News gave it a five star review. The show went on to tour theatres in Wales and made a big impression in Swansea, where tickets sold out and Bonnie Tyler made a guest appearance.

Its latest run lasts until Christmas, with shows seven days a week including matinees. It promises to bring a flood of visitors to High Street, which Swansea Creative Hub is making a new focal point for artistic activity in Swansea.

Swansea Creative Hub is a “creative cluster” of some of Wales’ most vibrant and talented creative groups, housed in buildings belonging to the new Urban Village development. The Urban Village will also include flats, courtyards, retail units and the refurbished King’s Lane warehouse.

Swansea’s Urban Village – home to Swansea Creative Hub – has reached a landmark stage in its development. Wales’ Housing, Regeneration and Heritage minister Huw Lewis AM poured the final concrete for Urban Village’s first phase last week.

The concrete completed the main frame of an impressive structure that will house eight High Street units, a number of commercial units, 76 flats and a car park.

The structure is central to the ambitious £25 million “Urban Village” revamp of High Street and The Strand. When completed, the Urban Village will include flats, courtyards, retail units, the refurbished King’s Lane warehouse and a “creative cluster” bringing some of Wales’ most vibrant and talented creative groups and individuals to Swansea.

Already on board are Volcano Theatre Company, broadcaster and songwriter Mal Pope, Supersaurus Artists’ Collective and Swansea Music. Arts. Dance.

The aim of the Urban Village is to transform the run-down areas of High Street, King’s Lane and The Strand. Huw Lewis said:

“The Urban Village will breathe new live into Swansea’s High Street, with vibrant shop frontages, attractive commercial space and numerous residential units. Additional parking will also be developed near-by and the Village is close to the station, creating easy access and transport links to bring workers and shoppers directly into the heart of the centre. I am delighted that Welsh Government funds are helping to regenerate the High Street area of Swansea.”

A new billboard has gone up in Swansea High Street… here are some photos… more to follow soon…

What’s been happening on the site? Here’s a couple of photo clues…

1. Destruction!!!

2. Building!!

Swansea Creative Hub are delighted to announce that the new venture from the artist collective known as Framework is alive and well and housed in a previously empty office space on Orchard Street.

Supersaurus will be making their presence felt in and around the main Hub site on High Street so keep your eyes peeled!

Framework is a group of six artists working in Swansea. Their individual practices have a multidisciplinary approach ranging from live work, participatory work, video and installation, but what is key to their shared practice is the need for community and interaction.

The groups launch event in February 2007 Bring Music Bake Bread in Mission Gallery, Swansea invited people to bake bread together in the gallery space whilst listening to favourite pieces of music and resulted in over one hundred people baking bread together over the course of the evening.

The group started by meeting regularly in order to discuss each other’s work and ideas and to support each other in the transition from degree to practising artist. With the belief that there was a lack of a sense of community for artists in the area, and that this was a major factor in people leaving the city after graduation, they decided to extend the support they had created for each other by creating a space for artists to meet and socialise and to show work in a supportive environment.

Framework are Owen Griffiths, Dan McCabe, Tom O’Sullivan, Fern Thomas, Adele Vye and Paul Woodland. If you would like to contact them, email frameworkcontact@yahoo.co.uk.

There are a number of opportunities to learn print making techniques at Swansea Printworks. You can find more information about the courses on their website or download the programme as a PDF file.

Tapestri is a new cafe, arts venue and social enterprise set up in the old Police Station on the apex of Orchard Street and Alexandra Road.

It aims to give support to people needing an extra chance to learn the skills, training and experiences needed to support a career path within the catering industry.

Tapestri offers cafe facilities with free Wi-Fi and has function rooms for hire and event catering services for a variety of social events, such as the Artawe Arts Festival.

Its ethos is to bring good quality, locally sourced food to the area, using Fair-trade goods and providing excellent customer service in a vibrant cafe bar atmosphere.

The Anatomical Theatre is putting on a shot in The Hubs space at 229 High Street on the evenings of November 12th and 13th. The play will explore themes of fear, survival and heroism, and is inspired by B movies such as Plan B from Outer Space, said to be the worst film ever made. The Anatomical Theatre was founded by Dan Jenkins and Lucy Bedsall. Here’s the trailer for their show:

A fledgling Welsh theatre company will present their new production in an empty shop space in Swansea this weekend, marking another theatrical performance in the Swansea Creative Hub.

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The Evening Post reports that its readers have added their voices to those of local traders, who are sick and tired of the alcoholics, drug addicts and beggars in Swansea High Street, which has been labelled “The worst entrance to a city centre in the UK”.

Rebecca, from Swansea said: “There are plenty of available commercial properties there. “Why don’t South Wales Police take over a small one and have an office there?”

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