Features / skateboarding
The skatepark that resurrected an empty building
The rattling and crackling of skateboards whizzing past as you walk inside Shredenhams is a testament to their success since opening in March 2025.
What was once a Debenhams and then an empty building is now home to one of Bristol’s most vibrant community spaces and an indoor skatepark.
Campus Skateboarding, the not-for-profit organisation responsible for the transformation, have some prior experience in transforming empty buildings into community hubs across Bristol. They’ve successfully done this for the former south Bristol swimming pool site and an abandoned youth centre in north Bristol.
Shredenhams opened in Broadmead in March 2025 – photo: Rob Browne
But Tim Nokes, co-founder of Campus Skateboarding, said it was not an active choice to acquire this site: “I think even for us it would’ve felt like too much of an ambitious thing to seek out.”
But when an agent representing the landlord of the Debenhams site approached them, things changed
“He reached out with an email because he’d been to our south Bristol site. He’d spent time there with his children and understood a bit about us taking over abandoned spaces.
“At the first viewing, it all seemed a bit too crazy. It was all stripped out for demolition, and there was no electricity. There was an awful lot of work to do and a lot of costs.”
Some items from Debenhams have been repurposed for the skatepark, like this former escalator – photo: Rob Browne
The space was renovated in six weeks, with a full skatepark built.
“It’s a very creative DIY space, which is something Bristol does very well,” added Tim.
General manager Millie Denman was heavily involved with renovating the space and building the bar.
She said: “It was an amazing experience to build everything with them and see a derelict space come to life.
“We noticed a response from the community straight away. Before we opened we already had over 1000 followers and the launch event was insane, with over 150 people signing in to skate.
“And now it’s been almost a year but people are still so intrigued by us.”
People who come to Shredenhams can skate if they want, but they can also choose to relax by the bar, play an arcade game or enjoy a round of pool – photo: Rob Browne
As well as the impressive indoor skate park, the space has a pool table, arcade games, table football and ping pong.
Millie continued: “Being in a derelict building does come with its issues, like the temperature. It’s so cold in here and it can be hard to get people to just come in for a drink, which is why it’s so good that we have lots of different activities.”
The site was only meant to be there for six months. However, the organisation have now renewed their lease until March 2027. During this time, the team has learnt a lot more about how to work within the city and how their different sites compliment each other.
Tim shared: “Because of our central location, we’ve been able to have a lot of big events here with some amazing partners. We just did one last weekend with Carhartt, and before Christmas we had an event with Adidas.”
On Friday, Shredenhams will be launching their first music gig in their new back room space.
They hope that after that, the site can become a much more diverse venue and give way to more opportunities to nightlife and entertainment.
“We’d love to be another venue for people that have ideas or are in bands and want to push something forward and get it off the ground,” added Tim.
The skaters had to relay the names of tricks to the commentator – photo: Hannah Massoudi
As well as live music, Campus are trying to cater to a wider variety of community groups, including after-school clubs and holiday clubs where parents can drop their children off at 10am and pick them up at 4pm.
“Every Thursday night we have a Magic the Gathering group that comes in and every Sunday we have a Beyblades night,” added Millie. “It’s really nice to see all these different pockets of the community.”
While they’ve seen a very positive response from the community, Tim shared that operating and maintaining the building has still proven to be difficult.
“It’s expensive to run a space this big and even just to employ the staff but hopefully extending the lease will give us some more stability and space to grow. Ultimately, it’s such a big building and it would be a shame for it not to be used.”
People are free to use the skatepark for skateboards, bikes and scooters – photo: Rob Browne
Thanks to both public nominations and judging from expert panellists, Shredenhams has recently been shortlisted in the Business category for the Bristol Legends awards in March.
Tim said: “The fact we’ve been put up for an award in business innovation is mind-blowing and amazing.
“It’s such an honour to be included alongside these intelligent and creative businesses.”
Bristol Legends is a new way for us to recognise and uplift the people, organisations and charities that make our city so special. We will be covering Bristol Legends, from all walks of life, with multi-media content across our channels. Awards will be announced at a unique celebration at Ashton Gate Stadium on March 6 2026. This will be unlike any awards show you have been to before so make sure to get your tickets here.
Main photo: Rosie Burgess
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