A quarter of a million euro in new funding has given the Watergate Theatre a glimmer of hope for its post-pandemic future.
The Kilkenny venue is getting the second-highest allocation in the country out of eleven organisations benefitting from this tranche of 1.5million under the Cultural Capital Scheme. (More on that here).
Executive Director Joanna Cunningham says it’s great timing to have this cash injection confirmed, telling KCLR News “I applied for this funding in January 2020 and we’ve since had this devastating blow to our sector with the Pandemic and this is the glimmer of hope we need for rebuilding and it’s for a sense of optimism and a future in our sector so it’s wonderful news, we’re very happy”.
She adds “The Watergate Theatre is a very well-loved building and it’s not a new building so it requires an upgrade which is going to involve insulation and a great deal of upgrade really which will focus on making sure that it is up to speed in terms of carbon footprint and environmental friendliness really”.
And she says the main change people will see out of this funding is a new surface to the outside of the building, noting “People are very fond of the Watergate, rightly so, it’s a beautiful old Art Deco structure, but what we will do is we’ll put some curtain wall insulation around the outside which will insulate the building but it will just aesthetically improve the building as well to make it look renovated and a little bit more scrubbed up I suppose”.
