Watch a film documenting Thekla’s £1m renovation via live stream

Watch a film documenting Thekla’s £1m renovation via live stream

Posted on: 14 Sep 2020

The short film features interviews with Roni Size and IDLES bassist Dev.

 

The Thekla team have announced plans to host a special live-streamed film screening this week, showing a short documentary that followed the progress of the venue's restoration work last summer.

 

Taking place across three months in 2019, the £1 million project saw Thekla temporarily moved to Bristol's dry dock for a new hull to be fitted, ensuring the boat would be able to stay afloat for the foreseeable future.

 

The documentary, produced by promoters and Thekla owners DHP family, will be live-streamed via the venue's Facebook page at 19:00 on Wednesday 16 September.

 

 

From June to September last year, fifty workers in the Albion Dockyard worked around the clock, seven days a week to fit a brand-new stell hull to the world-famous floating venue in record time.

 

Over a hundred tonnes of steel and three tonnes of weld wire later, the boat was ready to return to its rightful place in Bristol's floating harbour and get back to doing what it does best.

 

As well as documenting the extensive renovation works, the documentary features interviews with legendary Bristol producer and DJ Roni Size and IDLES bassist Dev, as the pair pay homage to a vital part of Bristol's musical landscape.

Thekla undergoing its £1m renovation in 2019.

Before its current use as a music venue, Thekla was a cargo ship, built in Germany in 1958. In its early years, it carried goods between northern and western European ports before running aground at Gatesend, Norfolk in 1975.

 

The boat was left to rust seven years in the docks of Sunderland, before being purchased by Vivian Stanshall and Ki Longfellow-Stanshall.  

 

Then, in 1983, Thekla arrived on Bristol’s Floating Harbour to become an events space. 

 

A proper bucket list venue for artists across the UK and beyond, as well as a beloved platform for local and up-and-coming talent, Thekla is a firm favourite among music fans both locally and from further afield. 

 

Tune in on Thekla's Facebook page at 19:00 on Wednesday 16 September for an exclusive look at last year's renovation works.

Read more:

 

 

Article by:

Matt Robson

 

Editor - 365Bristol.com & LOUD Magazine
 

Matt is a Journalism graduate and writer, passionate about supporting Bristol music, art and independent business. Get in touch via email at matt@365bristol.com.