The Beach Hut Café and Extreme Academy sports centre have a casual, laid-back character that reflects Newquay's surf lifestyle. Designed by Andrew Dart.
Newquay is the largest of the seaside towns on the North Cornish coast, a traditional bucket and spade resort. Although it still has about 4.3m visitors a year and achieves 7m bed nights annually, it has shared with others a period of under-investment.
Many hotels are showing their age and there has been a consequent fall in the number of visitors, a decline made more painful by the relatively short summer season. Since the 1920s, Newquay's sandy beaches have been a magnet for surfers and the town claims to have been the birthplace of European surfing. The development of the wetsuit has turned this into a year round activity enabling surfers to take advantage of different weather conditions. The attraction of the surf beaches for swimmers, walkers and spectators - even storm watchers - has now been recognised as a major asset for Newquay, encouraging the town to rebrand itself as the surf capital of Britain.
