Beach Hut 449

Hut 449 is the most westerly of the huts involved in the Beach Hut Advent Calendar and it's over a mile and a half from yesterdays hut 44 beside Hove Lawns.

The plan had been to make this a prayer hut during the afternoon so that anyone who was walking past might take the opportunity to stop for a few moments of quiet to reflect, meditate and if desired to pray or write down a prayer.




Unfortunately the weather was howling a gale all afternoon and the conditions were not at all conducive to being quiet, meditative or prayerful.  The artist and her steadfast volunteers spent most of their time trying to get the hut set up with everything blowing all over the place unless it was nailed down!


Fortunately the wind subsided a little during the evening and Julie had been able to create a beautiful tableau of the virgin Mary being visited by the angel Gabriel who announced to her that she was to bear a son and call him Jesus.


Julie Carroll was the artist and she was inspired by the prayer of praise that Mary uttered on hearing this news.

“My soul magnifies the Lord,
and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour,

for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant.
For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.
And his mercy is for those who fear him
from generation to generation.
He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;
he has brought down the mighty from their thrones
and exalted those of humble estate;
he has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty.
He has helped his servant Israel,
in remembrance of his mercy,
as he spoke to our fathers,
to Abraham and to his offspring forever.”

The next hut is also up by Hove Lagoon and is being put together by local Kidz Klub who run youth clubs across the city of Brighton & Hove.

Beach Hut 44

Tonight was a special night as we knew that many of the delegates from The Art of Ritual conference would be coming down to the hut as part of their programme for the day.  So we pulled out the big guns and asked Beyond team member Kirsty Tyler to get her creative thinking cap on and produce something wonderful for us all to see and she exceeded all our expectations.

Hut 44 beside Hove Lawns became the home of a beautiful, hand-crafted nativity scene built entirely from cardboard.  Not only was the scene gorgeous to look at, but it was also animated via a series of handcranks and cams which made the various figures come to life when someone chose to turn one of the handles.

The angel on the roof opened and closed her wings.

The donkey nodded in the direction of the baby Jesus.


The star twirled in the sky like a dancer pirouetting.

T

The wise men seemed to have got mixed up with a lost sheep.




At the heart of it all were the holy family, bedded down in the straw and trying to focus on the wellbeing of the baby rather then being distracted by any guests.

Tomorrow we're at hut 449, right beside Hove Lagoon.  Another one of our team, Julie Carroll will be at the hut throughout the afternoon, offering to pray for you or with you.  Please drop by any time after 2pm to join in with this and the official opening time will be 5.30pm as usual.

The Art of Ritual

Today Beyond hosted The Art of Ritual conference with support from the Westminster Faith Debates.  I brought together artists, celebrants, ritual practitioners, event designers and performers to look at the boundaries between all these roles and the place of ritual and art in contemporary human experience.

It was a fascinating day covering all sorts of interesting topics which we hope to blog about in more detail later.  But for now, here are a few photos from the event to give you a flavour of our day.





The opening ceremony encouraged us to focus on the creative spark in each of us.











Turning the remains of the sparklers in a creative bubble.

Cole Moreton invents a 'human sparkler' ritual.

Such happy, creative people!

Beach Hut 404

In the blustery windy weather we found our way to Hut 404 focussing on In the Bleak Midwinter.  Hut owner Tanya Somerset had imagined the cold winter personified in the figure of an ice queen, poised in the middle of a frosty scene.

Tanya is a bespoke couture costume designer who brought all her skills to bear in creating a fantastically magical hut.






To go with the wintry theme we could also listen to music from the Narnia soundtrack which related to the snow queen imagery.

There was also an altruistic motive to the hut tonight as Tanya Somerset of Bolli Darling is raising money for Heart Research UK and in particular their Aortic dissection division as she lost her husband to this 3 years ago.

Despite the high winds on the beach there was a steady stream of visitors and the table with mince pies and mulled wine was kept busy most of the evening.








 The design featured lots of white feathers which made up parts of the queens costume and included some birds wearing their own feathered costumes.








This hut was beside Hove Lagoon and we head to almost the other end of the one and a half mile stretch of huts all along Hove seafront.

The next destination on our Advent pilgrimage is hut 44 and the work of Beyond artist Kirsty Tyler.

Beach Hut 225

Tonight was all about Christingles both large and small.  Hut 225 had been turned into a giant Christingle and was full of lots of small Christingles made by the children of St. Andrew's school in Hove.

Christingles can be traced back to a Germany in the mid 1700's but only really took off in this country in 1968 when the Children's Society ran the first Christingle service.  Now lots of churches hold them and you can probably find one at a church near you at some point during the Christmas season.  The church which is now the home of Beyond will be holding a Christingle service on Sunday 20th December at 5pm if you would like to come along and make your own.  The service will be at St. Luke's Prestonville, 64 Old Shoreham Road, Brighton, BN1 5DD you can find a map here. 

Christingles are full of the symbolism of the Christmas message.  The main part of a Christingle is an orange which represents the world.  This has a red ribbon wrapped around it which represents the blood Jesus shed for the world.  There are four cocktail sticks with dried fruit or sweets on them, these represent the four seasons and the fruits of the earth and finally the whole object is topped off with a candle which stands for the light of the world.

Some of the St. Andrews school children also came to the hut to sing, ably accompanied by some of the teachers on guitars despite the cold wind blowing along the seafront.

At the end of the event everyone got to take their own Christingle home with them which will remind them of the true meaning of Christmas throughout this Advent season.

Our next hut is number 404 down near Hove lagoon.

Beach Hut 218

It's been almost a year since we last blogged, but we're back bigger and better than ever before.  Tonight the eighth Beach Hut Advent calendar launched to a huge crowd who had all come to see the hut created by St. Christopher's School Hove and themed around We Three Kings.

The great thing about having a school involved in creating a hut is that so many of the children can contribute, either by making art for the hut or by singing in the choir or doing various other bits of the preparation that goes into an event like this.


It also means that lots of parents come down to add to the crowd who have already heard about the calendar via a flyer or the huge amount of media coverage we've had in the last few days.

The calendar was featured on the front page of The Argus yesterday and they devoted a whole two page centre spread to the story of the huts, you can read their online article here.  BBC Sussex and Surrey Radio featured the huts on Sunday morning and Juice FM did a couple interviews yesterday while Heart radio have been promoting it all day.  Latest TV invited Revd. Martin Poole to sit in on half an hour of their news show yesterday afternoon to be interviewed about the event (you can watch that interview here) and tonight BBC SE TV turned up to record some interviews and do a live link into the local news at 6.45.



The hut art this evening used an interesting technique to create a visual effect which could only really work at night.  The kings were represented with draping swaths of white cloth which had been decorated using fluorescent paint.  An ultraviolet light was installed inside the hut, shining directly onto the fabric and illuminating the patterns on the cloth so that the colours sang out to the night.

The wise men from the East theme was continued with the star that hung above the hut tonight, guiding all the Beach Hut Advent Calendar pilgrims to the right place to receive their mulled wine and mince pies and the sing along with the choir.






The next hut also involves a local school as St. Andrew's Church of England school will be creating Christingles in hut 225.

See you there!

BEACH HUT 395

Photo courtesy of Julia Claxton

Our pilgrimage through Advent has finally come to an end at beach hut 395.  It's been an amazing journey this year with bigger crowds than ever, a wider variety of wonderful artworks and pretty good weather apart from a few slightly wet and windy evenings.

Photo courtesy of Julia Claxton

Tonight we joined the wise men in their journey following the star to Bethlehem as we sang As With Gladness Men of Old.  The carol speaks of the joy they found as they were guided by the star to the manger bearing the light of the world and that in that brightness they'd found the source of all divine light.

The hut beamed with light both inside and out as a giant glitter ball was spinning above the hut to guide people to the evenings festivities.  Inside a golden crown was suspended in the middle of a silver decked hut with lasers emanating from the crown and reflecting on the mirrored floor and walls.  All of this was enhanced by the smoke being produced inside the hut reminding us of the frankincense brought by the wise men as one of their gifts.

Photo courtesy of Julia Claxton

Suspended ethereally above the crown was a suggestion of the babe who is to be born on Christmas day.

There were many other things to remind us of light tonight.  At 5.30 Santa passed overhead in the form of the International Space Station, a bright light traversing the sky for all to see.

During the evening the Mayor of Brighton & Hove, councillor Brian Fitch, presented Revd. Martin Poole with an award from the Prime Minister entitled a Point of Light award.  This is given to individuals who have developed projects which are volunteer led and which promote community spirit. It is wonderful to have this work recognised in such a way and it was fitting that it should be awarded today as we welcome Jesus, the light of the world, into our lives.

That's the end of the Beach Hut Advent Calendar for 2014.  If you would like to be involved next year either as a hut owner, and artist or a volunteer please email info@beyondchurch.co.uk  Beyond does more than just beach huts and we are currently running a series of monthly events on the first Sunday of every month.  The next one is 4th January and you can read about it here www.beyondchurch.co.uk  

Photo courtesy of Julia Claxton

BEACH HUT 418

Tonight was a special night as the theme carol was O Holy Night, a beautiful carol which has gained great popularity in recent years but is quite hard to perform well.

The opening lines are:

O Holy night,

The stars are burning brightly

It is the dawn of our dear Saviours birth.

Hut 418 was a vision of that starlit light come to earth in the form of sparkling lanterns that lit up the darkness of the night in homage to Jesus, the light of the world.

The simplicity of the light was enhanced by a fairly strong wind tonight which gently rocked the hanging lanterns, giving us a constant reminder of the creativity of God.

The next hut is the final one for this year and there will be lots going on.  In particular the Mayor of Brigton & Hove, Cllr. Brian Fitch will come to the hut to present Martin Poole with a Points of Light award from the Prime Minster.  More of this to follow later.

BEACH HUT 449

The wind was up again tonight so it was quite blustery down on the seafront but that didn't stop over 100 people coming to see the hut and share a mince pie and some warming drinks.

We were in hut 449, the most Westerly of all the huts in this year's calendar and right up at the darkest end of Hove Lagoon.  The hut was a beacon of light in the darkness and the scene inside had a ethereal quality almost as though the shepherds were floating on a cloud, which they probably were when the heard the angels good news.

The theme carol was 'While Shepherds Watched their Flocks by Night' and the hut came complete with rustic shepherd, a couple of sheep, a herald angel, a small town and a signpost telling us that we were three miles from Bethlehem and 25 miles from Jerusalem.

We're getting close to Christmas now with only two huts left.  The next hut is number 418 and our final hut on Christmas Eve will be a great night with a visit from the Mayor of Brighton & Hove to make a special presentation.

BEACH HUT 79a

Hut 79a tonight featured the three kings challenge as the hut not only looked nice but there was a series of interactive challenges which people could take part in.











The carol theme was We Three Kings and the hut decoration consisted of three silhouetted kings making their way towards the star.  The kings were displayed on large pockets which contained a series of instructions for further play or rewards.  These worked a bit like a lucky dip as attendees were invited to take something from the pocket behind the first king.  This would either give them an immediate prize - a chocolate coin or similar, or would lead them to take a further token from the second pocket with the chance to win an ever more extravagant gift.









This helped people to focus on the aspect of gift giving which is such an important part of this advent season.  One of the benefits of the Beach Hut Advent Calendar is it's non-commercial nature and the respite it gives to those who want to get away from the constant pressure to shop for the perfect gift.









The gift of Jesus at Christmas is the exact opposite of so much of what has become the Christmas spirit.  The gift from God to humankind on that first Christmas was totally free and unexpected.  We hope that your gift giving will be in that same spirit this season.


Next hut is right at the other end of the line of huts at number 449.