Let Londoners live, work and play in Westminster Fire Station!

We are a community-interest company that wants to enshrine the significance of this 107 year old Grade 2 listed building for the benefit of all Londoners.

We have a self funding plan, working with London's top developers, architects, space planners, Locality and Article 25. By utilising Section 106 and Local Infrastructure Grant as well as considerable private and social investment we will develop the fire station into a flagship Westminster Women's Resilience Centre, offering:

* a community owned and run café
* affordable rent flats for key workers
* a vibrant art centre showcasing the talent of Westminster's diverse constituency
* a state of the art business and conference centre
* a People's Town Hall
* affordable housing for key workers living in the Tri borough area,
* services for all women, including a crèche and childcare centre,
* a refuge for women who have survived domestic violence, an accredited training centre for women who want to enter the construction industry
* subsidised space for charities and social enterprises run by women
* a Fire Station Museum celebrating the history of the building, operated by former firemen, teaching Westminster's young people fire health and safety
* luxury flats, for sale only to Londoners, who pay UK taxes and work in London
*retail space, a pop up shop and cultural events reflecting the cool capital and enterprise owned and run by Londoners.

The community spaces such as the café and People's Town Hall will be open to men, who are an essential part of building a safe, inclusive and vibrant community. This is a space for co-opting the brilliance of London, its citizens' natural talents and building the best and brightest future for women and men alike.

Our Purpose:
We believe in women as change-makers in their homes and communities regardless of background, culture, class, race or faith. If a woman believes in her inherent qualities and approaches these from a glass half full perspective, she increases the capacity for her natural resilience. She learns to equip herself with the skills and strength to move forward positively in life, she will move mountains. With the support and mentoring of women who have already proved their success, they can mirror successful habits, seed and grow aspirations.

We know from personal and professional experiences how challenging life can be. We know how a bad decision can end up in catastrophe. We know how hard it can be to make changes when the system and circumstances seem stacked against you. As resilient women, we believe in creating a safe space where positive change can happen for women struggling to create it for themselves across all levels of society and cultures.

By joining our aspirations for better lives and extending those out into the locality, the Westminster Women’s Resilience Centre is a community owned and operated driver for sustainable change, on an individual and a community level.

The Westminster Women’s Resilience Centre will be a space for all women as ex-offenders, teenage girls exiting gangs, victims of domestic violence, single-parent families, living in poverty or excluded.

It’s also a space for the most successful women in business and society. Together they will meet, learn, inspire and be inspired by each other in a safe environment that taps into their shared aspirations and experiences. This is a unique space, perhaps the first in the world, where women co create the community and develop the programs and the projects they wish to thrive. Mentoring, sharing and enterprise are our core values.

In times of severe austerity, communities, local authorities, social and charitable enterprises and private sector businesses all in the process of recovery, having been traumatised by the failure of the banking system in 2008. We have to build a resilient, sustainable future, with community at its heart, to align with a new commissioning landscape and also with what people want, in their local services.

As local authorities face economic retrenchment and austerity it has become more vital to build resilient communities where the local authority works in partnerships with local communities and other agencies to build social capital where local people can build from their own strength and assets. Westminster Women's Resilience Centre will offer social care, housing, probation, medical and counselling services a safe space to meet their service user community. The co location of services, for women to access on a formal or a drop in basis has been proven to show better outcomes.

This pioneering building will showcase how we can build social capital, the importance of collaborative working and will explore some of the tools for community building in a digital age.