The lofty redbrick walls of All Souls church in Bolton still dominate the streets of terraced housing around it but, like churches in many towns and cities, it has long since been redundant, abandoned by its former congregation.  The gothic revival style of the 19th-century building and its tower is at odds with the modest homes surrounding it. Built to serve the mill workers once so numerous in this part of town, the church fell into disrepair after the workers left and, in 1986, its often vandalised doors closed for ever behind the last departing parishioners.  But All Souls is reopening to the public, regaining its place as a focus for the local community, albeit this time without any religious bent. After a project that has been 10 years in the making at a cost of around £4.9m, local people were invited in to see how Victorian architecture could be revamped to create not just offices and conference centres, but halls for clubs and hobby groups, a garden for a local grow-your-own project, a concert space and a business and training centre for local startups.  Those who rescued All Souls hope it will be a blueprint for hundreds of churches up and down the country that are struggling to avoid collapse – thanks either to roofs too costly to repair or simply to a steady decline in church attendance. In 2006 a report by the Tearfund showed that, although some 53% of Britons called themselves Christian, only one in 10 went to a service each week and two thirds never went to church.  But while figures such as those might worry church leaders, others have been more concerned about what the loss of church buildings means for communities – from Brownie packs to old-age pensioners’ drop-ins to yoga classes left with nowhere to meet.  “When a church closes, a community loses much more than a place of worship; it can lose its heart. That is why this project and the others we’ve been involved with are so important. We would like All Souls to be a blueprint, to be a model that can inspire communities up and down the country, and hope that we can bring back into use far more of these buildings,” said Matthew McKeague, regeneration taskforce manager for the Churches Conservation Trust (CCT), which has more than 300 churches in its care and, together with the Heritage Lottery Fund, has been behind the scheme to save All Souls.  All Souls was typical of the 200 urban churches featured on English Heritage’s at-risk register – neglected, looted and facing a £1.5m repair bill.  It was Bolton businessman Inayat Omarji who first spotted the potential of what was fast becoming a symbol of the decline of the northern industrial town.  All Souls was an eyesore, covered in graffiti. Omarji, who last month won a English Heritage “Angel” award for his single-minded determination to see All Souls restored for local people, approached the CCT for help.  He organised consultations with local people and an ambitious rescue plan was drawn up. “We wanted to make the building useful to every person in the community,” Omarji said. “Not only will the space be partially used as a future centre for heritage learning; there will be films exploring local history and a ‘history wall’ of community mementoes and artefacts. The building site itself has even been a location for teaching and promoting traditional heritage crafts to the local community.”  With its 36-metre tower and slate roof, All Souls was helped by the fact that it was unique. Its roof has the largest unsupported span of any British church, the result of the determination of Thomas Greenhalgh, an evangelical mill owner who paid for it to be built in such a way that all the congregation was equal under God. No pillars or columns would make any seat better or worse than another.  “He didn’t want any posh seats. Everyone would have an uninterrupted view; that’s what has made All Souls unique and won it its grade two listing, which, in turn, attracted the funding,” said the director of All Souls, Andrew Suter, one of six people who will now be employed by the new centre. “It looks amazing, and it’s wonderful to be able to return it to the ownership of local people and see their reaction when they walk in. It has a wow factor. It remains a consecrated building, so services can still be held.”  Two modern “pods” have been built within the original shell and there is a walkway that allows people to admire the stained-glass windows. “This is a deprived area, where people are struggling on low incomes, with English as a foreign language, and this is so needed – a place for integrating, for skills and learning. It’s been a catalyst for the CCT,” said Suter.  A decade-long partnership has transformed St Paul’s into a bustling circus skills centre and performance venue. The 17th-century grade-I listed gothic church has been transformed with circus rigging, a state-of-the-art lighting system and the UK’s second largest permanently rigged indoor flying trapeze.  A £5m partnership project with mental health charity Suffolk Mind will transform the church into a heritage and wellbeing centre. The project is due for completion next autumn.  St Nicholas’ Chapel, King’s Lynn  A £2.7m project will allow the chapel to be used for events by installing new toilets, kitchen facilities and an open space. The scheme is considered a flagship for sustainable technologies in historic churches.
Tracy McVeigh: Bolton’s All Souls church will reopen this weekend as a creative hub after 30 years of closure. Now English Heritage hopes to repeat its success at ailing places of worship across the country