Silx Teen Bar

About Us

Silx Teen Bar Youth Project has been at the heart of the Blyth community since 1996, offering free support and activities for young people aged 11–25 through three core initiatives: Teen Bar, Employability Project, and the Detached Street Engagement Project.

Teen Bar

The Silx Teen Bar is a multi-award-winning project that provides a safe, welcoming, and inclusive space for young people aged 11–19. Open four evenings a week (Monday to Thursday, 5:00–7:45 pm), we offer a wide range of free recreational and educational activities, all delivered by our team of qualified youth workers.

Activities include pool, arts and crafts, healthy cooking, team games, PS5 gaming, jewellery making, nail art, makeup sessions, and workshops on key issues such as relationships, drugs, and alcohol. Young people can also receive advice and guidance on any personal challenges they may be facing.

In addition to our weekly programme, we encourage young people to get involved in social action projects that benefit both themselves and the wider community. Past initiatives have included participation in the Blyth Town Carnival, local litter picks, and donations to food banks.

We also believe in broadening horizons—each month we organise at least one out-of-area trip, and during the summer holidays, we offer weekly trips or residentials. Wherever possible, we ensure these experiences are free or low-cost.

Employability Project

Running for over 15 years, our Employability Project supports young people aged 16–25 who are not in employment, education, or training. We provide practical, one-on-one support to help them overcome barriers and take positive steps forward.

Our drop-in sessions run every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from 12:00–2:45 pm, staffed by experienced youth workers who offer support on a range of support including:

CV writing and job applications
Interview preparation
Budgeting and managing debt
Housing and benefits advice
Access to training and qualifications

Young people have free access to laptops, internet, and printing facilities during these sessions.

We also partner with Central Training to offer in-house CSCS training, where participants gain a CSCS card along with the IOSH Safety, Health and Environment for Construction Workers qualification. In addition, we offer a wide range of FREE online courses across various subject areas.

To help boost confidence and strengthen CVs, we work closely with local employers and providers to secure meaningful work experience and volunteering opportunities for the young people we support.

Detached Street Engagement

Alongside our centre-based work, our Detached Project involves outreach youth work three evenings a week. Our dedicated team engages with young people who may not access our centre, building strong relationships, offering support, and helping keep them safe.

We work closely with the local police, residents, and community partners to reduce anti-social behaviour and ensure young people feel valued, supported, and included in their community.

Our Vision

At Silx Youth Project, we believe that every young person deserves the opportunity to thrive. Through our holistic approach—combining recreation, education, outreach, and employability support—we empower young people to reach their full potential and play a positive role in their community.

(Updated September, 2025)

Registered Charity: 1118360

Silx Youth Project takes your privacy very seriously, you can access our data privacy notice here: https://www.silxteen.com/download/silx-data-privacy-notice/

LET’S PLAY A GAME OF NUMBERS!

Numerical visualisation of what we've done

Silx Teen Bar is proud to be the largest youth provider in Northumberland with innovative and new projects and activities that endeavour to meet the needs of the young people of Blyth. Our provision consists of an evening youth club project and a very successful day time employability project working with young people aged 16-25. We also deliver weekly sessions on the streets of Blyth, making contact with young people that use the streets as a means of recreation.

Below is a summary of some of our figures for the year so far (May 2024-April 2025)

RECENT BLOG ENTRIES

What spins our world

Employment

CSCS Course Success for Employability Project

October 17, 2022 By silxadmin

In October 2021, we hosted our first CSCS course at Silx with the support of Central Training. Since then the project has gone from strength to strength. CSCS cards are needed to allow people access to a construction site and although historically some people were able to work without them, now this is not the […]

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People

Silx Summer of Fun

September 17, 2021 By silxadmin

Its hard to believe that summer has been and gone and that the young people have all returned to school. We know how difficult the past 18 months had been on our young people and we wanted them to have a fantastic summer with us once restrictions were eased so we organised a fun packed […]

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CHARITY

We are Back!

April 26, 2021 By silxadmin

LATEST COVID-19 UPDATE In March 2020 we had to close the doors to the project for the first time in its history. The building has remained closed since however we have still been working and supporting young people in Blyth. We have held Zoom calls daily and offered support virtually, we have been able to […]

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People

Latest Update from Silx

February 3, 2021 By silxadmin

We can’t quite believe that we are in February already and that the pandemic has been going on for almost a year. As you all know we are in another national lockdown and we just wanted to clarify what that means for Silx and let you know what we are currently offering. TEEN BAR The […]

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People

Tier Two Rules and what it means for you & Silx

October 21, 2020 By silxadmin

The North East is currently on COVID level high which does mean there are a number of things we can and cannot do and we thought with half term looming it would be a good idea to clarify what the rules mean for you, our young people when it comes to socialising. Meeting up with […]

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OUTDOOR

Stationary Gifts for Back to School…..

September 7, 2020 By silxadmin

Last week saw the majority of our young people getting back to a sense of normality by returning to School, this was a big step after being out of school for the best part of 6 months. So, we decided we wanted to give something to our young people to make going back to school […]

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