What £1.6m of grants actually built across St Ives

A brewery built on top of an old mine network. A fisherman who finally has somewhere dry to mend his nets. An art gallery in the shell of a former bank. What connects them is a pot of grant money that has just run its course.

The St Ives Enterprise Grant Scheme reached its final stage at the end of June. Over its lifetime it awarded £1,637,342.70 to 67 projects, with a combined value of £2,730,345.17. Every project is now financially complete.

The Town Deal funded scheme launched in 2022 and was open to any small or medium sized business in the St Ives Town Deal area. Existing businesses and start-ups could bid across three separate rounds. Between them, the funded projects created 38 new permanent jobs, safeguarded another 10, and improved, renovated or repurposed more than 1,400sqm of enterprise space.

In a recent evaluation, more than 75% of businesses said the grant had brought more customers through the door. 77% reported a positive or very positive impact on their resilience and on diversifying their income streams. 62% said the same about profitability.

“Our aim was to support and broaden the economic base of the town and create a really vibrant and active economy which supports all year-round businesses and provides all year-round employment,” said Andrew Baragwanath, Chair of the St Ives Town Deal Board.

He added that small and medium sized businesses make up a large proportion of the town’s enterprises. “By helping them to become more productive and plan for the future, we have made a real difference to our economy and the lives of everyone who lives and works here.”

A brewery on top of the mines

Mine Brewery started in 2019, when Elise, her husband and her parents put money into a shipping container and a 100-litre brewing kit. They met keen home brewer Andre along the way. The business now sits somewhere between the big, hoppy beers of the US and traditional ales.

“It was started on a bit of a whim, but once we’d started we knew we wanted to scale up and create a viable business from what started as a hobby,” said Elise. “We named our business Mine Brewery Company, and found a bigger, second-hand kit. We needed somewhere to house it, so we put in an application for a grant to convert an old building owned by my dad.”

The grant funded a timber frame build inside that existing building. The new location sits on top of St Ives’ consolidated mine network, which gave the brewery its name and inspired the three beers it produces.

Mine Brewery now brews off a 2500 litre kit and sells direct to local retailers and hospitality venues, delivered by an electric van also backed by the scheme.

“Thanks to the Enterprise Grant Scheme, we’re now in a position where we can approach businesses outside of St Ives, off licenses, pubs and bars. We have the stock to be able to deliver to a much wider audience,” said Elise. “We’re also getting to a point where we will have to start thinking about employing people. This is a side hustle for the five directors, but it’s becoming a mega side hustle. We would love to offer employment to local people, that would be a fantastic development.”

Somewhere dry to mend the nets

Aiden took up the chance to become full-time skipper on the town’s second-largest fishing boat last year. He then found he had nowhere to store his gear.

“I’ve always had to be very organised and stick to routine, allocating time to bring everything down, take it back up again, and repair nets elsewhere. It takes up a lot of my day and means I can’t be flexible,” he said.

Many of the town’s fishermen work out of net lofts in the old pilchard cellars on Porthmeor, where they can store gear all year round and there is room to repair nets. Every pen was occupied.

“With all the pens occupied, I have never had the option of taking one on, but I did make it known that this would be something I would be very interested in, should the opportunity arise. I knew it would just make life so much easier day to day.”

One cellar had been left vacant so visitors could view an original pilchard cellar, cobbled stone floor and all. Chris Hibbert, Manager of the Borlase Smart John Wells Trust, saw an opening when the scheme launched.

“We’ve known for a while that there was demand for more workspace from our fishermen, but space in St Ives is in very short supply,” said Chris. “Converting the old pilchard cellar was the obvious next step to support the next generation of fishermen, but it wasn’t commercially viable enough for us to fund it. When the Enterprise Grant Scheme was introduced to the town, we saw it as a fantastic opportunity to support this particular young fisherman.”

Aiden is delighted with the result. “Now, I’ve got a workspace and storage space to make nets, maintain my gear, and store it all. It means that everything I need is under one roof, right where I need it to be. I can pop down, repair a few nets, and come and go as I please. Most importantly, it’s dry and warm.”

Reopening the old Edward Hain wards

When the NHS left the Edward Hain building, the wards were left almost untouched. Sinks, curtains, signage and even the iconic NHS green paint all stayed put. The community bought the building for £1.2 million, and the large mortgage that came with it left little for renovation.

“It was very overwhelming. There was a lot of work that needed doing to bring things up to scratch,” said Centre Manager Sharron Goldingay. “The lift needed a major part, and the fire exit wasn’t wide enough to comply with the latest regulations. Those things needed remedying before we could open the top floor.”

The grant paid to refurbish the ground floor and bring it up to standard. That let the centre host clinics, counselling sessions and a wide range of community activities.

“We refurbished the bay windows at the front of the building so we could let in fresh air, and we carried out works on the roof. The grant gave us the crucial funds needed to welcome people through the doors. It meant we could start generating income and begin moving towards self-sufficiency,” said Sharron.

The centre now welcomes almost 1,000 visitors each month. Its programme runs to pilates, chair yoga, knitting clubs and more, and it offers rooms for hire alongside long-term rentals for health and wellbeing businesses. In 2024 it gave St Ives Food Bank permanent residency.

“Thanks to the Enterprise Grant Scheme, we were able to open our doors and spread the word about this fantastic new resource,” said Sharron. “We now provide several rooms at no cost to community organisations that offer free activities, this cost is offset by renting rooms to small businesses. This grant has made a direct and lasting difference. It really was the key cog that got everything moving.”

Turning food waste into clothing

Will Besant has worked in St Ives hospitality for many years and has watched extreme seasonality bite the town’s young people. He has built a business around it, combining a love of fashion with the place he calls home.

Will takes raw food waste, such as peelings and stalks, from St Ives’ hospitality businesses and turns it into clothing dyes. Working with high-quality plain white organic cotton garments, he creates sustainable, high-end pieces. The company gives local chefs, restaurants, bars and coffee shops boxes for their food waste, which is collected on e-bikes for a zero-carbon delivery system.

“One in four people in St Ives work in hospitality, many of whom will have zero-hour contracts. Quiet winter months can greatly affect people’s lives. For our youth, long-term job options in town are very limited,” said Will. “When you have an economy that is based on tourism, you create a lot of waste. I wanted to start a business that tackles tourism’s environmental impact. It should also offer year-round jobs with fair wages for the town’s youth. My plan was to create a model whereby employees can invest in the company and enjoy a share in the profits.”

The scheme funded everything for the dyeing operation and let Will scale up quickly. He now plans to make furniture from the town’s plastic waste, and wants a leading role in finding ways to make coastal, tourism-driven economies more sustainable.

“As we grow, we really want Pandemonium Projects to become a legacy company for St Ives, run by young people in the community,” he said. “The plan for the brand as a whole is to address the issue that affects coastal communities, which rely heavily on tourism and generate significant waste. That problem exists, not only nationally, but internationally.”

A new life for the former HSBC

The scheme also helped secure the future of three heritage buildings in the town. One is the former HSBC building, which is now part of St Ives’ arts scene.

The building had lain empty since the pandemic. Eighteen months ago Cornish Masters moved in and redeveloped the ground floor into a gallery built around the town’s rich history of art.

“We specialise in historic art,” said Mark Wilson, Director of Cornish Masters. “We wanted to create a gallery more akin to the model seen in London, where galleries tend to specialise in a period, late Victorian or 20th Century Modern British, for example. But Cornish Masters isn’t defined by a single period of art history. Instead, we concentrate on a geography. One of the wonderful things about Cornwall is that it has been at the cutting edge of the British art scene at least twice.”

The grant supported the gallery’s second development stage, which aims to make the 115-year-old building more sustainable for the future.

“It’s an old building, so there was significant water ingress into the basement that required an engineered solution to the problem,” said Mark. “The grant has enabled the development of the building to create storage and events space, which enables the gallery to host talks by artists and historians. It also covered new storage for paintings, WCs, and a small kitchen from which event catering can be provided. The work we’re carrying out with the support of the scheme will enable us to confidently employ two more people.”

“To me, one of the main benefits is that the building will remain good for another 100 years or so. It is a beautiful Cornish granite landmark building on St Ives’ High Street. Without the investment and renovation, it would have continued to deteriorate.”

The Enterprise Grant Scheme is one of nine projects funded through the £19.9 million Town Deal for St Ives. Cornwall Council is the lead authority for Cornwall’s Town Deals, supports the governance role of the St Ives Town Deal Board and administers the fund. A full list of projects supported is available, with more detail on the Town Deal website.