A look around The Mix youth facility development in Stowmarket. Project manager Adri van der Colff.

BUILDING work at a multi-million pound youth centre project, which is due to open next year, is gathering pace.

The Mix, a £6million youth centre which is being built at 127 Ipswich Street, Stowmarket, will open next March.

The project was given a boost after Mid Suffolk District Council said it was in favour of the planning application – to demolish a Victorian town house at the front of the site – in a planning meeting on Wednesday.

The East Anglian Daily Times was allowed inside the building on the same day to check how the work is going.

Project manager, Adri van der Colff, said: “The Mix will be a fantastic opportunity for young people because it will be a place where they can learn new things, explore their talents, meet their friends, and just have a space where they can hang out and enjoy themselves.

“The Mix is currently in two phases – the back of building which is 85% of the project, we hope to have completed by March 2013. The front of the building, which is currently subject to planning – should be done by the summer of 2013.”

The facility will feature a performance room, two art rooms, exhibition spaces, a cafe, a recording studio and accommodation spaces.

Suffolk County Council is due to announce its decision on the planning application next month.