Westfield awards £25,000 annual grant to ensure lasting legacy – Inside Croydon

Every little helps: Croydon’s Legacy Youth Zone to receive £25,000 a year for three years from multi-billion corporation Westfield

Croydon’s Legacy Youth Zone will receive £75,000 over the next three years as part of a “new partnership” with Unibail-Rodamco Westfield, the French-owned multi-billion shopping center developers and owners.

URW announced the deal with Legacy, saying it “is part of URW’s wider investment in the area and builds on its long-standing relationship with national youth charity OnSide”.

Legacy, on Whitehorse Road in Selhurst, will receive £25,000 a year until 2026, as another youth project OnSide, West, in Hammersmith and Fulham, will benefit from a similar package,

Westfield, in various corporate guises, has had an interest in Croydon for 12 years, where it announced it would redevelop the Centrale and Whitgift Center town center shopping centers in a £1.4bn, part retail, part leisure, partly residential. system. The new shopping center was originally supposed to open in 2017.

Paris-based URW operates 72 shopping centers in 12 countries, including 38 that carry the Westfield brand. The company is currently believed to be worth £9.4 billion.

The West Youth Zone is part of EdCity, a £150m regeneration scheme which aims to bring improved community facilities, affordable homes and what URW describes as “an innovative education hub” to the White City, where Westfield managed to deliver one of its shopping centres. .

In the corporate announcement, URW said: “Over the next three years, URW will invest £25,000 a year in both youth areas, totaling £150,000. Funding will be directed towards creating opportunities and access to learning and activities for young people.”

Croydon’s Legacy Youth Zone was built with significant investment from Croydon Council, but from 2021 it lost its grant funding from the local authority and now relies on donations, sponsorships and corporate goodwill.

Open seven days a week, the center offers young people access to a range of support services and activities including sport, arts, music, employment and mentoring, as well as state-of-the-art facilities such as recording studios, climbing. walls, Apple apartments, well-being studios and kitchens.

Last month, Legacy welcomed 3,499 children and youth through its doors.

Gavin Evans, CEO at Legacy, said: “We are delighted to welcome URW to our family of supporters and look forward to developing our partnership together over the next three years for the benefit of young people.

“URW’s commitment will ensure that thousands of young people in Croydon have access to a safe and inspiring place 52 weeks a year.”

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