THE chapel owners of a 215-year-old former workhouse that hosts a town community centre and council offices have been given the go ahead to extend and modernise the building.   

Glebe Chapel aims to develop a dedicated first floor space for worship at Newent Community Centre so that ground floor activities can continue without disruption. 

Forest planners have given the go ahead for a single storey extension, an atrium,  a three-storey staircase extension and the installation of a third floor mezzanine level at the former poorhouse, which also hosted Newent Grammar School from 1922 to 1965. 

The upgrade will raise part of the roof and see external and internal alterations to the building, which stands at the junction of High Street and Ross Road.

Chapel members gave more than £90,000 in two weeks as well as raising other funds in 2016  to purchase the premises – which some said were no longer viable –  from Gloucestershire Council.

A report to Forest planners on behalf of the applicants said: “Historically the Chapel has always been involved in the welfare of the local community, serving Newent for more than 55 years.

“When the opportunity arose for Glebe Chapel to elevate their work with the community and ensure that the community centre continued, their members raised  the  necessary  funds  to purchase the centre.”

As the Newent Poor Law Union opened in 1804, the building provided a home and workhouse for those who had fallen on hard times. 

The report added that once the chapel took over three years ago, “it soon became apparent that the much-altered property with its various additions and multiple levels was  not  best suited  to meet the needs of the  local  community well or our client in its activities to support its congregation.”

It currently provides a home for 20 community groups, ranging from Newent Town Council, to small rent- ed out office spaces and youth organisations.

Architects say the new design will lead to a “much-improved street scene with a modern design that will also reflect the medieval history of Newent and the local conservation area”.

Glebe Chapel began its life in open air meetings in an orchard in Clifford Mesne held by a group of Brethren from Cinderford in 1930.

A chapel was built in the orchard in 1932 and meetings began in Newent in 1947, when a room in business premises in Ledbury Road were used.

In 1960, a plot of land in Glebe Close was purchased and Glebe Gospel Chapel opened on the site in March 1962. 

After the congregation vacated that chapel in 2016 to move to the community centre, it was sold and planning permission obtained to demolish the building and replace it with eight homes.