AMBITIOUS plans to bring Kendal's Brewery Arts Centre into the digital age are set to be realised after it secured a major Arts Council grant.

The £500,000 funding pledge will help fund the centre's ambitious 'Brewery Digital Upgrade' project. It will allow digital visual arts presentations for the first time and include the installation of 'green screen' and digital playback facilities.

"The Brewery Digital Upgrade will propel the Brewery into the 21st century," said chief executive Richard Foster, who explained that the funding would offer a new range of learning experiences for people of all ages including those with special needs.

And importantly, Mr Foster added that the grant would hopefully enable the centre to offer its facilities to the housebound or those living in remote areas.

"We are exploring ways in which digital technology can reach isolated residents unable to travel to Kendal," he said.

The grant forms part of Arts Council England's 'Capital: Small Grants' programme, and the aim of the project, which is due to go ahead in spring 2019, is to construct a new digital learning hub which will improve the way the centre presents its huge range of screenings, live streamings and exhibitions.

The new equipment will also enhance the way the centre presents its very popular range of creative learning classes and allow those attending to develop new and innovative ways of producing art and film.

More than 1,700 adults attended such classes at the centre in the 2017/2018 period.

Mr Foster pointed out that the Brewery was noted for being largely self-supporting and pointed out that more than 75 per cent of its income was generated by its own activity, and therefore the grant would enable it to direct more of this income into further developing the centre's extensive programme of events.

However, a proviso of the awarding of the grant is that it must be match funded and a public appeal will launch shortly.