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Family converts toilet block to eatery in 13 weeks

Lisa YoungCornwall
News imageEllie Pizey Joe, Ellie and Simon are standing together outside the building. She is smiling at Joe while Joe and Simon are smiling at the camera. Ellie is holding a small black and tan dog in her arms which is wearing a coat. Joe has a baseball cap on and Simon a woolly hat. Behind them is a stack of plastic boxes which hold tools and equipment. There is a piece of wood leaning against the building which has a large bifold glass door.Ellie Pizey
Ellie Pizey said the building had suffered a series of leaks

A family has succeeded in converting a Georgian lavatory block into a seafront bar and restaurant in 13 weeks.

When Ellie and Joe Pizey and her father Simon Penna secured the lease of the block in Greenbank Gardens, Falmouth, they all resigned from their jobs and threw themselves into the renovation.

Ellie said the building, which had most recently been used to store paddleboards, had been a broken toilet block with the ladies being "just a hole in the floor and lots of leaks in the ceiling".

Her father, who has had a career in horticulture, said he had always wanted to start a business with his children and it would be "a bit of a legacy for them".

News imageEllie Pizey A cracked urinal in the derelict building with an electric drill laid next to it. There is broken plaster everywhere and there is a small window which has a shutter across it.Ellie Pizey
The former toilet had most recently been used to store paddleboards

Penna, who most recently ran Falmouth Town Council's parks and gardens department, said part of the family's mission had been to improve the gardens, which were laid out in 1916.

He said: "You would have people camping and taking drugs and all sorts of anti-social behaviour going on, so part of our aim is to stop that and do some community stuff to improve our surroundings.

"We've already done that, we've jet washed a lot of the area and cleaned everything up and done some nice planting of palm trees so it looks so much nicer there."

News imageEllie Pizey The restaurant on a grey evening. There are three men in flowery shirts standing on the grass in the foreground. Many people are sitting at tables with drinks. The building is built into a wall and above it is a row of two and three-storey houses. Ellie Pizey
Glas is the Cornish word for colours of the sea

Ellie said they had named the new bar and restaurant Glas, which is the Cornish word for the colours of the sea.

She said they had wanted to reference green, since the venue is in Greenbank Gardens, but there was no Cornish word for either green or blue.

Truro and Falmouth MP Jayne Kirkham opened the venue on Friday.

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