Abbey Fields Leisure Centre has now closed ahead of its demolition, bringing 125 years of outdoor swimming in Kenilworth to an end.

Kenilworth's lido first opened on June 1 1896 and was subsequently rebuilt in 1935 and again in 1986.

But both the lido and the indoor pool are set to be demolished by Warwick District Council and replaced with two new indoor pools.

The centre officially closed on Saturday, December 18 and the date was marked by the Kenilworth Lido Campaign group which led a procession down from Talisman Square to the outdoor pool.

WDC will begin the demolition progress in early 2022, after removing the still usable equipment from inside.

Castle Farm Recreation Centre, which is also due to be demolished in the new year, closed on December 12 and operator Everyone Active has already begun to empty the building.

The campaign, which describe the lido as the "jewel in the crown" of Abbey Fields, had hoped that a new WDC working group would reevaluate the new swimming pool plans on environmental grounds.

The lido group said: "Implementation of these plans would be a betrayal of WDC district-wide ambitions that all public buildings should be 'net zero by 2025'."

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