Tadley Men’s Shed one step closer to establishing permanent home in grounds of St Mary’s Church

A community group dedicated to providing a space for people to pursue and practise practical interests and skills in Tadley is one step closer to establishing a permanent home.

Set up in January 2021, Tadley Men’s Shed began with its members meeting over Zoom before they started to meet in person fortnightly at the Tadley United Reformed Church with the aim of eventually raising enough money to establish their own workshop.

Tadley Men’s Shed has now bought a portable cabin which will become its permanent home.

The cabin was delivered and installed on the grounds of St Mary’s Church on Monday, August 21, and the group is already working on getting it hooked up to a power supply and moving machinery into the space.

Tadley Men’s Shed chairman Paul Gross said the new permanent base, which will likely take a couple of months to become fully operational, would give the group’s members much more freedom.

“It has taken a while to get some funds together and get the agreements together to get the portable cabin in place,” he said.

“Now we can start to develop the shed more widely and once the workshop is up and running, it will be available throughout the week when members want to go there and use the equipment rather than meeting on a Friday afternoon every other week.”

Mr Gross hopes the space will allow men’s shed members to pursue any practical interests, be that woodturning, electronics, photography or something else.