Community
10 July, 2026
Call for community ideas for hall use
CAMPERDOWN and Holy Apostles Reverend Matthew Jones is calling for ideas to increase the use of the St Paul’s Anglican Church hall building following a successful bid for funding to freshen the exterior.
As Western District Newspapers reported last week, the church was successful in receiving $2000 under Corangamite Shire Council’s Business Assistance Scheme for works to improve the hall.
The building, which was erected in 1896, requires works to replace rotting timber, remove the lichen which has grown along the façade and repaint parts of the hall.
Rev Jones said the initial plan for the works was to prepare the hall for an upcoming heritage event.
“The Open Camperdown Heritage event, which will be on October 17 this year, will showcase a number of heritage or historically significant buildings around Camperdown,” he said.
“Our hall, which dates back to 1896, fits into that category but it’s looking very tired and hasn’t been used a lot over the last 10 years or so.
“When we saw there were some grants available for significant community buildings, we thought we would approach the shire and see if we qualified – to our great delight, they’ve given us a grant.
“We can showcase our beautiful building of the church dating back to 1864 and the pipe organ dating back to 1894, which will mean three significant heritage buildings will be showcased on the day and open for the community to see and experience
“We are hopeful on the day to have the hall open and serve refreshments because there’s a very well-equipped kitchen inside.”
The upcoming works, however, have stirred ideas for Rev Jones to revitalise the hall and encourage the community to come up with ideas for events which could be held at the hall.
Currently, the church hall sees usage from Tuniversal, the Camperdown Hospital Auxiliary, Camperdown’s Country Women’s Association branch and, most recently, the Robert Burns Celtic Festival.
Other events held in the building include the Mad Hatter’s afternoon tea, Shrove Tuesday, movie nights, the Hospital Auxiliary Art Show and the inaugural trivia night.
Rev Jones said people he speaks to agree the building is architecturally beautiful but needs extra love due to rising damp and cosmetic issues.
“Structurally, it’s good, but cosmetically there are things which need fixing,” he said.
“Part of what we wanted to highlight in applying for the grant was to strengthen the role of the parish hall as a community hub and to try and find ways it can be used more.
“It has an overlap with quite a number of other organisations, but I think there could be a lot more usage if the building was updated.
“The only problem is, as a church, we don’t have the funds to do that.
“I’d also be interested to know what the community would be interested in using the hall for.”
Rev Jones said he hoped encouraging more usage will open up the hall to more funding opportunities to revitalise the building.
“If there were more opportunities like that, I think it would be possible to try and source funds from different places to do upgrades in different stages,” he said.
“It would be very sad to see it deteriorate any further.
“What we’re aiming to do with this first step is to make it look really good from the street – the next goal would be to open the doors and see what we can do inside.”
Rev Jones encouraged residents to reach out with their ideas for the hall.
“I can’t think of anything at the moment that I would feel confident to put out there as a promotional idea other than what we’re already doing, but when lots of people put their ideas together, it’s amazing what they can come up,” he said.
“I think there could be some really good ideas coming from the community.
“It certainly belongs to the church, but it really belongs to the community.
“It’s such a significant building for the community and has been for 130 years.
“It would be great if we could freshen it up, open it up more and provide another venue in this beautiful town for community events.”
Rev Jones also expressed his gratitude to the Corangamite Shire Council, adding he hoped the grant would be the first step in many to revitalise the space.
“The work will be done by one of the local businesses we do a fair bit of work with as we like to support local business as much as we can,” he said.
“We’re really looking forward to the Open Camperdown event in October where people can come along and see not just this beautiful hall but also the church and organ.
“An event like that, I think, really focused on how fortunate we are to have such beautiful heritage buildings that we are stewards of.
“Over that period, and particularly at the event, we may get some really good ideas coming forward for how we can use the hall more.”
Anyone wishing to share their ideas can contact Rev Jones on 0458 862 098 or can email their ideas through to camperdown.holyapostles@gmail.com.
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