Rich Mix Gets £2.2 Million Overhaul as East London Arts Centre Marks 20 Years

Rich Mix, the community arts centre that has occupied a corner of Bethnal Green Road in Shoreditch since 2006, is about to look significantly different. The charity has secured more than £2.4 million in total funding to transform its ground floor — adding a new entrance, expanding its public spaces and addressing infrastructure problems that have quietly accumulated over two decades of operation.

The largest share — £2.2 million — comes from Arts Council England’s Creative Foundations Fund, a £30 million national programme distributing grants to cultural venues across England. Rich Mix is one of 24 London organisations receiving support from the fund, alongside the Southbank Centre (£10 million for Royal Festival Hall repairs), Theatre Royal Stratford East (£1.75 million), Shoreditch Town Hall and the Kiln Theatre, among others. The Aldgate & Allhallows Foundation, City Bridge Foundation, The Clothworkers Foundation and Cockayne have provided the remaining support.

The timing is deliberate. Rich Mix turns 20 this year. Whether that anniversary feels like cause for celebration or reflection probably depends on who you ask — the organisation has had a complicated two decades — but the funding at least gives it something concrete to point to as it enters its next chapter.

What the Building Work Actually Involves

The investment will fund an 18-month ground-floor redevelopment. The most visible change will be a second entrance opening onto Redchurch Street — the building currently faces Bethnal Green Road, and the Redchurch Street side, which was previously a goods delivery yard, will be refurbished into a public-facing entrance with outdoor seating.

The idea, architecturally at least, is to create a physical connection between two quite different versions of east London: the long-established Bethnal Green Road community and the more recent commercial and creative scene that has grown up around Shoreditch and Redchurch Street. Whether a new door achieves that in any meaningful sense is a reasonable question to ask, but the intent is clear.

Inside, the ground floor will be reconfigured to offer more flexible space across café, bar, events and hireable areas. The practical point here is financial — Rich Mix needs income streams beyond ticket sales, and more adaptable space makes that more achievable. Essential infrastructure upgrades will also be carried out, including improvements to energy efficiency that should reduce running costs over the longer term.

Accessibility improvements include a Changing Places WC — a fully equipped toilet facility for people with complex disabilities who cannot use standard accessible toilets — alongside acoustic and visual enhancements and improved signage throughout.

Twenty Years: What Rich Mix Has Been

Rich Mix was not a straightforward project to bring into existence. The building — a former leather factory — had tens of millions of pounds spent on its conversion before it opened in 2006, and the finances of that process were scrutinised by both Deloitte for London Assembly members and PricewaterhouseCoopers for the incoming Mayor. The organisation nearly closed altogether in 2015 when Tower Hamlets Council pursued it for repayment of an £850,000 loan, before dropping the high court action.

It survived. And over twenty years it has built a genuine track record: the charity is a company limited by guarantee, registered at 35–47 Bethnal Green Road, E1 6LA, and its accumulated impact is substantial — 2.5 million audience members, over 62,000 film screenings, 10,000 live events, 150,000 artists supported, and more than 120,000 children and young people engaged through its Creative Engagement programme. It has also housed 20 creative organisations with a combined turnover of over £23 million a year, employing more than 320 people.

The building has three performance spaces and a three-screen cinema. It sits in Tower Hamlets — at the base of a residential block of flats — in one of London’s most ethnically diverse boroughs. That context was built into the organisation from the beginning: Rich Mix was conceived in the early 1990s as a response to cultural and racial polarisation in east London, founded by local councillors, activists and artists. The mission was always to be a shared space rather than an institution — free to walk into, representative of the communities around it.

How well it has succeeded in that aim has been contested at various points. The gentrification of Shoreditch during the same two decades that Rich Mix has been operating has changed the neighbourhood around it significantly, and the tension between serving an existing working-class and migrant community while also being adjacent to one of London’s most expensive postcodes is one that community arts organisations across east London are still navigating.

Leadership Changes Alongside the Bricks

The funding announcement comes with a significant organisational shift. CEO Judith Kilvington, who has led Rich Mix since 2019, will step down later this year after a transition period. She has been the driving force behind the capital campaign and, by her own account, considers the funding secured to be the right moment to hand over to new leadership.

Rich Mix is replacing the single CEO structure with a split model: a new Creative Director to develop the artistic vision, alongside a new Executive Director to run the organisation. Both roles will be supported by an Artistic Advisory Board, a Youth Board and the existing Board of Trustees.

The introduction of a Youth Board is worth noting. It signals at least an intention to give younger east Londoners a formal voice in shaping the organisation — not just as audiences or participants in programmes, but as stakeholders with a seat at the table. Whether that translates into genuine influence will depend on how the model operates in practice.

The 20th Anniversary Programme

To mark the anniversary, Rich Mix is delivering a co-curated programme of music, film, exhibitions and talks across 2026, exploring connections between the organisation’s own history and the underground cultures that have shaped east London’s identity — from grime and garage to British-Asian arts and community activism.

A new documentary, co-created with young people and drawing on oral history interviews with key figures from Rich Mix’s founding years, will premiere in Autumn 2026. A permanent multimedia exhibition will open alongside the refurbished building, intended to serve as a lasting record of what the organisation has been and a statement of what it wants to become.

The works themselves — the 18-month building programme — will be coordinated to minimise disruption to the venue’s ongoing programme, though the practicalities of a significant ground-floor redevelopment mean some disruption is inevitable.

Key Facts

All information is based on confirmed announcements from Rich Mix, Arts Council England, IanVisits and Arts Professional, May 2026. For programme information visit richmix.org.uk.