EXCITEMENT could be felt among staff as the doors of the Christie Centre’s new store officially opened on Thursday.
While the Christie Centre Collective has been open for almost a month, COVID-19 restrictions pushed back the officially celebrations until this week.
The Christie Centre Collective, 78 Langtree Mall, has transformed and empty shop front into a dynamic community hub, as part of Mildura City Heart’s UP Project.
“While the collective will be a fabulous place where people can purchase the amazing products from the Mildura Chocolate Company, GrowAbility Nursery, AroundAgain, ArtRageUs Studios and Christie’s Emporium, the real focus is on what this space will do for our participants,” Christie Centre executive officer Florence Davidson said.
“It will be an opportunity for people involved in workplace learning to practise money management and customer service, which will be meaningful experience that will help prepare them for mainstream employment.”
Christie Centre Collective project officer Sammy Jetson said the decision the join the project was an easy one, with the Christie Centre having been part of a similar effort in the past.
“We were part the Empty Space project initiative and since then we have expanded and grown so much, we now have a much more diverse and array of things to offer,” she said.
“Since opening people have been really excited to see something happening in the space and have been really impressed by the quality of the work and capacity.
“People are really excited by the community angle, it has a great vibe and people have continued to come back as there is always something new to look at every time you come in.”
Ms Jetson said the Christie Centre Collective was a retail store but also had a designated workshop space for community groups, made available for everything from mosaics to community singing, painting, drawing and drama.
City Heart manager Danielle Hobbs said she was “thrilled” to have the Christie Centre involved with the UP Project.
“When we concepted the UP Project, this is exactly what we had in mind, bringing innovative ways to fill the empty spaces and working with landowners and business owners in the region to enrich the precinct,” she said.
The pilot program was launched in April with an aim to re-establish a vibrant city heart, activating vacant commercial buildings while elevating the profile of Mildura’s CBD as a place for “commerce, creativity and community connection”.
“It’s been many and varied, we have had some great successes and some not great successes for example; one participant has ended up bypassing the UP Project and talking directly to the property owner, which is fantastic as that is the whole purpose of the project is getting the buildings leased,” Ms Hobbs said.
“We have another building that has now been dressed up as well. Tilley’s Furniture are dressing a window and it looks amazing and we also have a new participant moving into 76 Langtree Avenue shortly.
“The former Priceline building has quite a rolling number of participants as well — the last one was (the dance project) Dust-Off.
“We have the council school holiday program using it at the moment and Northern Mallee Leaders will be using it for an event, and the Mildura Writers Festival.”
The Christie Centre Collective is open weekdays from 9.30am to 3pm. There are hopes the collective may also open on weekends in the near future.
