# 15 Bournemouth BIC

The Bournemouth International Centre

 

The Bournemouth International Centre was opened in 1984 on the site of aging hotels in Cliff Cottage and South Cliff roads. Sir Patrick Abercrombie had suggested developing the site in the 1940s. In the early 1980s plans were fiercely debated, with Council meetings lasting 8 hours, over the £16 million cost. The centre was intended to host 4,000 conference delegates, boxing matches and tennis championships. There was to be a 73,000 sq ft swimming pool and a multi-story car park.

 

Early design included a series of glass-fibre tents and a three-star tower-block hotel. ‘Module 2’, the company which won the contract, began with a design like a dalek spaceship. The Council funded the centre by selling the Pier Approach Baths, land on the West Cliff and 45 acres of land at Littledown.

 

The Royal Fine Art Commission said of the design, that Bournemouth Council had ‘irrevocably damaged one of the most sensitive sites on the South Coast’. Supporters believed the BIC would put Bournemouth into the ‘European First League’. Work on the new structure started in March 1982; controversy dogged decisions to award the ventilation system to a Dutch company, and the marketing to a company based in Brighton – Bournemouth’s biggest competitor.

 

By July 1983, a new conference centre manager had been appointed – Mr Luis Canda – he forecast that the centre would extend the holiday season at Bournemouthm from 8 to 16 weeks in the summer. Mayor Jeanne Curtis officiated at the topping out ceremony in July 1983.

 

he centre was opened in September 1984, by Mayor Cllr Michael Filer, who declared that it marked the beginning of Bournemouth’s future. Visitors on the opening day could see the ‘Community Awareness’ exhibition, including two double-decker busses, in the main hall (which comedienne Victoria Wood later described as ‘like the loading bay at British Home Stores’. Outside, on opening day, language students raised flags of all the European countries.

 

The Centre has an early success with a visit by Johnny Mathis, which brought Town Centre traffic to a halt. At her later concert Shirley Bassey looked around the hall and commented ‘It will be nice when it’s finished’. 1,500 delegates from the Labour Party used the BIC for their conference in 1985. In September 1986 the Conservative Party arrived with PM Margaret Thatcher and (in the wake of the Brighton bombing) a £1 million security bill.

 

With a large Conservative Party conference planned for 1990, money was raised to build a £4.6million flying-saucer extension. Having run for 5 years, the BIC had made a modest profit of £60,000, but brought an estimated £20 million worth of business to Bournemouth.

Michael Stead, Heritage Team, Bournemouth Libraries