Surf Museum to be 'hive of activity'

IF PLANS to house the British Surf Museum in Braunton permanently materialise, the museum's director envisages making the building a real hive of activity.

Peter Robinson, who is currently based in Brighton, has big plans for the site at Vellator, in one of Saltrock's old buildings, which neighbours the new Saltrock shop and the Tiki headquarters.

Peter, who spent 15 years working for ITV as a reporter and later a web journalist said: "Braunton is the gateway to North Devon's beaches. It is the perfect place for the museum.

"It is more accessible than Cornwall and people love coming here.

"I really think this could be something which could really boost Braunton.

"We'll be leasing the building from Saltrock, who have been very supportive, and applying for funding for the project.

"As well as housing exhibitions and the collection of British Surfing History, we want it to be a social meeting place.

"We want to have a small cinema screen up for showing films, a music performance venue, art gallery, a cafe, and a museum shop."

The collection of British Surfing History includes artifacts and memorabilia, some of which are more than 200 years old.

Peter said: "We have Captain Cook's original journals describing surfing, and drawings from artists from the 1800s of surfing — but we also want to cover the past, present and future, and also look at the ocean, beach and environment, in conjunction with Surfers Against Sewage, and also look at beach safety with the RNLI."

Peter also has visions of tackling the obesity epidemic, by encouraging children to get into surfing.

He said: "We're going to be working with Nick Thorn Surf Coaching and hopefully doing something to get children involved in the sport."

At the moment Peter is busy securing funding, and trying to turn the British Surfing Museum into a charity, rather than a non-profit organisation.

"All the local surf businesses have been really supportive, and I've had advice from the planning department and North Devon+ . But the key is that we really want this to be a community creation, we want everyone to get involved, it's not just for surfers."

Peter added: "It has been a long struggle to get this far, six years of hard work, but we have a window of opportunity to get up and running in 2009 or at least by Easter 2010 and create a truly special visitor attraction that we can all be proud of."