We are a registered charity and the Community Centre for the market town of Ringwood – over 100 clubs, societies and organisations regularly meet in our various halls and rooms. We also hire out our halls and rooms for functions, events and meetings.

Greyfriars was formed as a charity in 1958 with the Georgian house fronting Christchurch Road. Over the years, halls and an Activities Centre have been added.  We are also planning ahead to meet future needs in Ringwood and a major current project is to build a new Arts Centre – actually on the Greyfriars site.

Some of our activities are welfare based, aimed at helping people in the community who need support – this includes the popular minibus service

When you make a booking with us you are also supporting our work as a charity in serving the local Ringwood community.

The lawn at Greyfriars is popular for outdoor events

Greyfriars President’s Tea Party

Wine, women and songs all contributed to the great success of the first event in 2018 to mark the 60^th anniversary of Greyfriars Community Association. On Sunday January 21^st about a hundred members and guests joined Greyfriars President Gillian Habbin for an afternoon tea at the Community Centre to celebrate not only Greyfriars 60^th anniversary, but also Gillian’s 90^th birthday.

Ann Pedersen, the Chairman of Greyfriars, welcomed everyone to the party and introduced a surprise guest, Gillian’s nephew David Habbin. This internationally acclaimed tenor treated his aunt and everyone else to a wonderful rendition of a selection of songs from the musicals, culminating in a rendition of ‘Happy Birthday’ to Gillian.

After a sumptuous tea provided by the ladies of Greyfriars Special Events Committee, Christine Hamilton, the daughter of Greyfriars’ first chairman Megan Holman, gave a speech in which she reminisced about her memories of the events leading up to the formation of the Community Association back in 1958. The centre soon became, according to Megan, ‘the warp and weft’ of the community.

Although Christine said she could just about remember a time before Greyfriars, she stressed that she could never remember a time without Gillian. She paid tribute to Gillian’s sixty years devotion to Greyfriars, as a founder member, as Warden from 1969 to 1995 and as President since 2011. Everyone was then invited to raise a glass of sparkling wine to toast both Greyfriars and Gillian, who thanked the assembled guests and, aided by Christine, used a ceremonial sword to cut the cake made by Brenda Titt and iced by Pam Adams. During the afternoon a memory book made by member Sheila Killen was passed around so that all could write their own personal messages to Gillian for her to keep as a memento of a very happy occasion.

Christine Hamilton talking to Gillian Habbin