Submitted by kasim.bukhari_11773 on
We are pleased to bring you another wonderful and inspiring story from one of our Action Together members this LGBT+ History Month 2024.
Kris Zemlik opened Billingtons Bar and Café in 2022, and has since had high hopes for Billingtons to become a safe space for all communities.
Here is what Kris had to say...
Can you tell us a bit about yourself?
I am the owner of Billingtons Oldham; I bought the building on Ascroft Street in the centre of Oldham during Covid Lockdown and opened to the public in November 2022. The century old building had been closed since 2016 and was a former Dance Academy. I have restored the building, complete with beautiful, mirrored ballroom and have created a coffee/cocktail lounge. It’s the perfect space for business/social/community events. I have brought dance, back to Oldham. I am also co-director of Ascroft Medical Centre and dental practice established in 2015 and based in Clegg Street and Ascroft Court.
I received the Special Recognition Award in the latest Oldham Business Awards.
What have you done for your community which you would like people to know about?
It is certainly for my work in restoring the urban building, which was known as Billingtons Dance Academy, now known as Billingtons Oldham. Over many decades of Oldham’s social history, hundreds of people of Oldham have met and danced there, have made lifetime friends and many have married. It is my vision and my honour to restore Billingtons Oldham and be its custodian for the benefit of the community of Oldham.
What does LGBT+ History Month mean to you?
As this year's LGBT+ History Month theme is Medicine, so, as someone who is a director of a medical centre, I am considering the past and future progressions in LGBTQ+ diversity in science, healthcare, and medicine but as an owner of an event space I am also keen to look at inclusion and wellbeing as that is certainly an area I feel that Billingtons Oldham can be a conduit for.
What change would you like to see in Oldham that would benefit the LGBTQ+ community?
Inclusion, more community co-hesion, more understanding of the LGBTQ+ community. I am hopeful that the inclusive events held at Billingtons Oldham will nurture some of this ethos.
I am working hard for Billingtons to become a ‘safe space’ for all members of our community who want to work/socialise together and help promote awareness.
And finally, what would you say to LGBTQ+ people in Greater Manchester to inspire them to make a difference in the community or wider?
LGBTQ+ people are not some new species that have landed from another planet. It is LGBT+ History Month… the writing is on the tin… LGBTQ+ people have been present throughout the centuries, but it seems that to a great extent they have been written out of history or ignored in plain sight. I want to work together with like-minded agencies/groups/people across all sectors of our community – business/voluntary/social to celebrate the fact that we are one community and inclusion matters. This month let’s celebrate our LGBTQ+ heroes, past and present …. whether that’s in medicine or dance!
Kris Zemlik
Billingtons Bar and Café