Please join us for a social evening to celebrate the disabled facilities in our building.

Listen to four local disabled artists give a performance of their work.

3pm onwards: Drop in, view the facilities and chat over refreshments.

5pm - 6.30pm:  Hear from local disabled artists about why access is important and what this means for their community. They will also give a short performance of their work.

6.30pm: Hot vegan meal will be served.

The artists performing will be:

Beccy Owen Singer, songwriter and chorister.

Jenni Pascoe, Poet.

Richard Boggie from Difference North East, poet and disability activist.

Ruth Lyon, musician, disability activist, wheel chair user, and band member of Holy Moly and the Crackers.

7pm-9.30pm: The event will conclude with an accessible club night geared towards people with learning disabilities.

Star & Shadow is 100% volunteer run.

Location is : Star & Shadow Cinema, Warwick Street, Newcastle, NE2 1BB.

Please email info@starandshadow.org.uk for any access requirements and further information.

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The Star and Shadow Cinema is delighted to announce the opening of its Changing Places Toilet to the public and is holding an event for the Disabled Community to celebrate this milestone.

A ribbon will be cut to officially open the new loo on Friday 25^th November, 2022.

The Opening event will begin at 3pm where people can come, view the facilities and chat over a coffee.

From 5pm - 6.30pm we will hear from local artists about why access is important and what this means for their community. They will also give a short performance of their work.

The event will conclude with an accessible club night geared towards people with learning disabilities finishing at 9.30pm.

 

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What is a Changing Places toilet?

A Changing Places toilet is more than an accessible toilet or a “disabled” toilet. It is a large room with a changing bench, ceiling track hoist, shower, toilet, and wash basin. It enables people with profound and multiple learning disabilities, as well as other disabilities that severely limit mobility, to get to the toilet or have their incontinence pad changed with safety, dignity and comfort.

Standard accessible toilets do not provide this equipment nor is there room to accommodate the carers who assist the disabled person.

 

Background to the project.

November 2022 and the Star and Shadow Cinema has reached another important milestone in the ongoing refurbishment of the building it purchased in 2016.

Most of the spaces in this large building were opened to the public in May 2018. By then the cinema, music venue and café were ready.

Prior to refurbishment, local people were asked what they would like to see in the community owned building. A Changing Places Loo was requested.

Without Changing Places toilets, the person with disabilities is put at risk, and families and carers are forced to risk their own health and safety by changing their loved one on a toilet floor.

That is if the disabled person and their carer leave their own home in the first place. The fact is, due to the lack of these facilities in public places, people needing them will either stay at home, or just travel within a few miles radius of their residence so that they can return home if they need to use a bathroom. Therefore they are cut off from social and cultural activities.

Knowing this, there was no question that the Star and Shadow would install a Changing Places Toilet in its new building, and it was included in the architect plans from the outset.

For the past four years it ploughed back £15,000 from its own trading activities to pay for the installation. It received a grant for quarter of the total cost.

The covid closure delayed progress but we are finally ready to open the doors of this fantastic facility to the public and welcome its users and their carers to socialise in our building with comfort.

 Further Information:

Although the numbers are increasing, there are still not enough Changing Places toilets across the country. Providing these toilets in public places would make a dramatic difference to the lives of thousands of people who desperately need these facilities.

Information, including installation specifications and a map of where to find a Changing Places Toilets, can be found on this website Changing Places Toilets (changing-places.org)