The Mermaid construction has reached the halfway point, and – despite the best efforts of Covid and supply chains – our new centre for the arts, culture and learning will open its doors to all pupils from the start of the new academic year.
Windows are going in this week, and brickwork will begin next week. But it is not too late to become part of the lasting legacy of this exciting new venture.
We are asking supporters to sponsor a brick, which – for a donation of just £250 – you can name after yourself, your children or any other member of the Epsom community. Anyone donating £500 or more will have their names featured on the donor board in main entrance. These will become a prominent feature of the new building and a lasting legacy of your generosity.
For more information about how you can support The Mermaid, please contact Helen Tranter, Director of Development on 01372 821290 or helen.tranter@epsomcollege.org.uk
What is The Mermaid?
The Mermaid is our new centre for the arts, culture and learning. Occupying 2,000sqm, the building will house seminar rooms, a café, gallery, screening rooms and a lecture theatre.
When it opens to all our pupils in September 2022, The Mermaid will become Epsom’s primary co-educational space, inspiring academic excellence, intellectual curiosity and creative free-thinking.
Why ‘The Mermaid’?
In 1922, exactly 100 years before The Mermaid opens, the reading of plays was banned at Epsom College as the Masters felt it would become a “distraction from academic pursuits”. Undaunted, an enterprising group of pupils formed the Mermaid Society to pursue their passion for the arts.
The pupils named their society after the tavern on London’s Cheapside that played host to regular meetings between leading Elizabethan John Donne, Ben Johnson and William Shakespeare (although that is a matter of scholarly debate).
The Mermaid, in turn, is named in honour of those pioneering pupils from Epsom’s past and will serve as a space in which the next generation of creative free thinkers can blossom.
