Eastwood Park’s new sports pavilion is now complete and will be opened officially on Saturday 16th May by Councillor John Burrows.

The facility will provide changing facilities for sports groups using the park as well as a tea room and kitchen facilities and a community meeting room.  It will also have new male, female and disabled toilets which will be open to users of the park to replace the ones currently open on Hasland Road.

The project has been funded partly by a grant of £150,000 from Sport England’s Inspired Facilities fund, with the remaining £201,000 provided by Chesterfield Borough Council.

Councillor Chris Ludlow, Chesterfield Borough Council’s executive member for health and well being, said:-

“We have lots of regular users of the park’s sports facilities, including bowling, football and cricket clubs and we hope that the new pavilion will bring new groups into the park.

“Our thanks go to Sport England for their grant funding, without which the new pavilion would not have been possible.

“I’m particularly proud that our builders and apprentices have delivered the project – offering the most cost-effective solution and providing employment for local people.”

Charles Johnston, Sport England’s property director, added:-

“The Inspired Facilities Fund has made a huge impact on grassroots sports since its inception, and remains one of our most popular funds. Since 2011, we have invested £94 million into 1,800 projects to improve and refurbish existing sports facilities all over the country.”

“It is great to see Eastwood Park join the long list of successful projects to benefit from this fund and we are looking forward to seeing these improvements make a huge difference to the local community, and to help more people to play sport.”

During the ceremony a plaque will also be unveiled to thank the Friends of Eastwood Park for their hard work, support and dedication during the park’s restoration project.

Eastwood Park reopened in June 2013 after a 10 month refurbishment thanks to £1.3 million in funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund and the Big Lottery Fund.

Chesterfield Visitor Information Centre has been highly commended in a prestigious industry awards ceremony.

The centre in Rykneld Square, operated by Chesterfield Borough Council, received the accolade in the visitor information provider category of the VisitEngland awards for excellence 2015.

Councillor Amanda Serjeant, Chesterfield Borough Council’s cabinet member for town centre and visitor economy, said:-

“The VisitEngland awards for excellence are prestigious national awards and I am proud that our Visitor Information Centre has been nationally recognised.

“Our friendly, hard-working staff are the first contact many visitors have with Chesterfield. Their knowledge about the borough and the wider area, including the Peak District, is second-to-none and this award is well-deserved.”

James Berresford, VisitEngland’s chief executive said:-

“It is a great achievement to win a Highly Commended Award in a field of very high quality applications.

“The award places Chesterfield Visitor Information Centre in the top five businesses for excellence in their category in England. I warmly congratulate them on this achievement.”

 Chesterfield VIC VisitEngland award shows (left to right): Lady Cobham (chairman, VisitEngland), Catherine Walker, Kerry Sheldon, Anne McFarlane, Bernadette Wainwright and James Berresford (chief executive, VisitEngland).

Chatsworth has been awarded Silver in the ‘Large Visitor Attraction of the Year’ category at the Visit England Awards for Excellence 2015.

The award was presented to the Chatsworth team by the national tourism body at a glittering ceremony on Monday 11 May at the Sage Gateshead, which drew together the country’s top visitor attractions. The Visit England Awards for Excellence are firmly established as representing the highest accolade in English tourism.

The Duke of Devonshire comments:-

“We are absolutely delighted that Chatsworth has been awarded Silver in the Large Visitor Attraction of the Year category at this year’s Visit England Awards. Chatsworth is a very special place with a dedicated and passionate team, who continually strive to exceed visitor expectations and deliver excellent customer service. I am thrilled that the hard work and commitment to our visitors has been recognised at such a high level.”

The award recognises businesses that incorporate best practice, demonstrate excellence in customer service and are committed to delivering the very best in quality and innovation.

This year’s busy programme at the Peak District (Derbyshire) country estate includes launching the Chatsworth Festival – Art Out Loud, a major new literary festival; the 10th anniversary of the Beyond Limits monumental sculpture exhibition; plus, fun for families throughout the summer culminating in the ever popular Country Fair ahead of the glittering Christmas displays.

Chatsworth has undergone significant change in recent years with improvements to its events, exhibition programme and visitor services. For example, last year it added a new contemporary art and sculpture exhibition in the house and garden by Michael Craig-Martin; ‘Chatsworth in Wartime’, recreated the State Apartments as the girls school dormitory they used during WW2; a week of evening events called ‘Luminaire’ was held in the autumn with house tours by candle light and spectacular night-time projections in the garden.

Customer service training has built on the theme of ‘Excellent to Extraordinary’ while the increasing number of visitors from overseas has driven greater foreign language interpretation in the house, including Chinese. Food and toilet facilities have been upgraded in the garden and farmyard while access to Chatsworth has been improved with more frequent public transport as well as better onsite parking and driveways.

Chesterfield full-back Tendayi Darikwa was the star of the show at the club’s Player of the Year awards night, picking up four awards at the sold-out event.

Darikwa was named Player of the Year – as voted for by the fans – and also Players’ Player of the Year.

Jay O’Shea picked up the Goal of the Season gong for his stunner in the Good Friday match at Yeovil Town – a strike that came at the end of a 17-pass team move as the Spireites came from 2-0 down to win 3-2 at Huish Park.

The Fan of the Year award went to Lesley Brentnall, who has not missed a game, home or away, for 18 years and acts as a matchday steward for True Blue Travel.

Ian Browes and Jean Roper received an Outstanding Contribution award as recognition for running Young Spireites, which is now in its tenth year.

Around 500 people attended the event, which was held in a large marquee erected in the Proact Stadium car park. Sky Sports broadcaster Nick Johnson and BBC Radio Sheffield commentator Phil Tooley were the comperes.

Those who attended were also treated to an exclusive unveiling of the new home and away shirts for next season, which were modelled by Academy Player of the Year Jake Beesley and fellow new professional Laurence Maguire.

After the awards ceremony, guests were entertained by multi-hit band The Christians, whose set included ‘Harvest for the World’, ‘Hooverville’ and ‘Words’.

Spireites chairman Dave Allen said: “It was a superbly organised event and I’d like to praise Paul Watts, Kevin Fitzgerald and Nick Johnson for putting it all together. It was the biggest Player of the Year event ever staged by the club and I think it was Premier League standard.”

A new bar is set to open next to the Crooked Spire Church in Chesterfield this May.

Named ‘Apartment,’ the forward-thinking venue has a New York city-vibe and will offer quality cocktails, spirits and beers alongside a range of regular and pop-up events – from salsa nights to whisky tasting sessions.  It will also be available for private hire.

One of the directors commented:-

“Apartment hopes to contribute something significant to the town centre which will create greater footfall and improve the social experiences that the town has to offer as a whole.

“There will be a strong focus on putting a little extra love and care into what we do, to create a fantastic, unique experience to both locals and visitors.”

Apartment launches to the public on Sunday 24th May with ‘Celebrity Karaoke’.  More information on this, other events and employment opportunities can be found by searching on Facebook for ‘Apartment Chesterfield’.

Volunteers are wanted to help mark the 750^th anniversary of the Battle of Chesterfield next year.

Plans are already underway to stage a large medieval-style event in the town centre on Sunday, 15^th May 2016 with plenty of entertainment for the whole family to enjoy.

Community group, Chesterfield 750 is looking for people with a range of skills to help from fundraisers and researchers to costume designers and musicians and asks anyone who is interested in getting involved to get in touch.

Publicity Officer, Colin Harrison, a member of the Chesterfield 750 group said:-

“In preparation of the anniversary there will be several separate events and projects – the first of which is the building of a cart to be used on the day. There are also proposals to make a series of videos about life as it would have been at the time, a miniature re-enactment of the battle and plans to involve schools – maybe with something like the design of their own banners. We also hope that as many local groups as possible will take part, in whatever capacity they will most enjoy.

“Actual historical details of events around the battle are slightly sketchy, which we will take advantage of to allow a wide interpretation of them.  We want this to be a fun event, rather than a strictly educational one, although we hope to provide some interesting information as a by-product of our research.”

The next meeting will be held on Tuesday 28^th April from 7.00pm at The Rose and Crown Pub on Old Road in Chesterfield and everyone is welcome.  For more information please email info@chesterfield750.co.uk or visit http://www.chesterfield750.co.uk/.

Wingerworth Fencing Club is celebrating its fifteenth birthday with two gold medals secured at the British Championships, which were held at EIS in Sheffield last weekend.

In the individual events on Saturday, Hannah Lawrence became British Women’s Champion, a title which she last held in 2008. Hannah won all of her fights on the day and none more convincingly than when beating fellow England and GB team mate Amy Radford, from Malvern Fencing Club 15-6 to take the championship.

The second day of was the team event and the Wingerworth Ladies beat every team in the competition and trounced Truro in the play off final by 45 – 29.  The team had been strengthened this year with the addition of Mary Cohen who joined Hannah Lawrence, Jayne Crook and Caitlin Chang.

Wingerworth Fencing Club coach, Tony Klenczar, said:-

“This was a superb weekend for Wingerworth and the promotion of fencing in Derbyshire. All the people in the club who are competing at this level work extremely hard, along with their coaches, to achieve these results.

“We are always keen at the club to encourage new people to take up the sport. We want Derbyshire fencing to be bigger and better than any other club in the country!”