The Wat Tyler Centre is now open to the public, offering a fantastic new facility for learning, celebration and relaxation at the heart of Wat Tyler Country Park.
The building is home to an exciting interactive exhibition that lets you explore the explosives factory heritage of the park and its future as a space for nature at the heart of developments in the Thames Gateway region. State of the art classrooms are available for school visits in the Diamond Suite which offers a great all-weather base for education visits exploring the park.

The new Café at Wat Tyler on the first floor offers great food with great views over the nature reserve at Pitseahall Fleet, especially from the deck of the balcony.
The Nobel Room is a fantastic venue for weddings, conferences, exhibitions and concerts with capacity for 250 theatre-style and 140 reception-style. At just 15 minutes from the M25, trains direct to Pitsea from central London and plenty of local affordable, quality hotel rooms, the Nobel Room offers a great new venue whatever the event.

Building is now in its final phase and the Wat Tyler Centre is on schedule to open in Summer 2009.

The work will transform the iconic building at the heart of both the old explosives factory and the Sea Transport Stores into a state of the art visitor centre with an 80 seat cafe/restaurant, conference, entertainment and education facilities.

The structure and design includes features that will minimise the building’s environmental impact. A large capacity water recycling tank has been installed and will capture the run-off from the huge roof, use some to flush toilets and transfer the rest to a series of ponds and a wetland that will provide new habitat for the wealth of wildlife already to be found at Wat Tyler.

Another great feature is the passive ventilation system.  No need for expensive pumps that use electricity. The air will be drawn in through four large ‘chimneys’ that will eventually be located on each apex of the roof.

A feature that nobody will see but all visitors will benefit from is the heating system – a wood-burning boiler. The wood – fast growing willow – will be grown and harvested at the adjacent landfill site, on a large, restored section of the lower slope. Once chipped and dried, the fuel will be transported the 400 metres to the new centre and fed into the boiler.

It’s a carbon neutral cycle – in simple terms, the willow grows and locks up the atmospheric carbon dioxide in its tissues. Then we dry and burn it, releasing the CO2 back into the atmosphere to be locked up again by the continuously growing crop.

Find out more about the Wat Tyler Project