AN historic Darwen building has been taken over and revamped in a bid to bring in more visitors.

The Olde English Kiosk in Sunnyhurst Wood was built for the community in Darwen in 1912, and has become a popular venue for weddings and other family celebrations over the years.

The running of the venue, which still belongs to the people of the town, has now been taken over by two married couples.

Lindsey and Paul Chapman, a beauty therapist and a brewery worker, and Lesa Waring, who works at BAE Systems, and husband Michael, a plastics fabricator, have been running the building for about a month.

Mrs Waring said they had worked hard to give the venue a new lease of life.

She said: “We have used 120 litres of paint sprucing up the place, we’ve redecorated it all and stripped the bar down.

“I want to make it how it used to be when I was a child, make it a place people want to go to, like in the good old days.

“We will still have weddings and christenings and other licensed functions.

“But we are also open during the day for people walking in the park to stop in.

“We’ve had a lot of good feed-back so far. We have had several hundred people come in during our first few weeks.”

Mrs Waring said there were lots of plans in place for events in the coming year.

She said: “As it’s the centenary next year, we are looking to run an event.

“But we want it to be for the whole community.

“And as it’s a Tudor-style building, we want to host banquet-style parties.

“We would also like to put on some charity events, for good causes like Cry and the Mountain Rescue Team, as well as the Friends of Sunnyhurst Wood.”