Elgar CourtBarchester Healthcare

Activities at Elgar Court Care Home

Our teams are trained to enrich the lives of residents through stimulating the mind, body and soul, and taking the time to learn about each person to ensure everyone receives support that adds enrichment to their life.

Our activities team are great at building the activities programme around the likes and interests of the people we care for. Ensuring that our social events offer fun and adventure is part of the ethos of our home; it’s important that those we support can enjoy an active and social lifestyle. Of course, there will always be those who prefer peace and quiet, and in these instances, a cup of tea and a chat are always welcomed.

Read our brochure ‘Life-enriching activities’ for more information about life in our care homes.

Read our brochure

Kerrie Perks

Activities Leader

Hello, My name is Kerrie and I provide the unique life enrichment for residents at Elgar Court. I moved to Malvern 12 years ago to live with my fiance and we have two tortoises and a snake. I love to play Dungeons and Dragons with my friends. I am very 'outdoorsy' and used to ride horses and compete nationally in athletics, specialising in track and field for Redditch and Bromsgrove athletics club. In my spare time, I love being in the kitchen and making treats for my family.

Celebrating life at Elgar Court Care Home

War Time Favourites with the D-Day Dollies!

As part of the commemoration of the 80th anniversary of Remembrance Sunday, we welcomed back the D-Day Dollies this week to sing and dance to wartime favourites from the 1940’s! And they sure did put a spring in the step and a song in their hearts of our residents who sang and danced along to this special event to mark Remembrance Sunday and we are always thrilled . Vintage song classics included, the Andrews Sisters, Judy Garland, and the inimitable Dame Vera Lynn, plus many others - the ‘Dollies’ setlist really is the soundtrack of an amazing generation.

Blankets Away!

Here at Barchester Healthcare Care Home in Malvern, Residents, Staff and our local community have been busy knitting squares to make blankets for the Charity ‘Operation Orphan’ who send aid to many war torn countries. In the past two months nearly 300 squares have been made into 7 blankets which are on their way to Ukraine ready to keep young ones warm this winter. Maddie Jones who led this activity for Elgar Court said, "Children especially are dear to all our hearts and we hope to continue to support it in future years . Operation Orphan is based in Nottinghamshire and exists to keep orphans and children safe, warm, healthy and learning".

Wool has kindly been donated and Residents have enjoyed knitting and crocheting over a cup of tea, knit and natter or just enjoying relaxing in each others company.

If you want to join in with our free Community Craft Cafe, come along and try your hand at something old or something new!

Celebration of Diwali

Diwali or 'The Festival of Lights' as it's known, is celebrated by Hindu people globally for the victory of good over evil, light over darkness and knowledge over ignorance. The word Diwali means 'rows of lighted lamps'.

Elgar Court residents learnt all about this festival and how traditions of lighting lamps (known as Diyas) and creating Rangoli Decorations of colored powders, rice, or flower petals are left in windows and doors, to help Hindu Goddess Lakshmi find her way in and bestow good fortune and wellbeing - which is perfect for our home - We gave Residents their own little light to put in their windows to welcome in blessings!

Some of our well travelled residents and their relatives have been to India, and we were fascinated by the stories and experiences they shared with us. Every day we find out something new about our residents making them even more unique - just like our care!

Wishing you a Happy Diwali!

Classic Car Sunday Welcomes Double Act!

Two brothers Chris and Andy Marter, braved the elements for Elgar Court Care home’s last Classic Car Sunday event on 19th October 2025.

Both Chris and Andy are proud owners of the elite German car brand, Porsche, and had never been to the care home’s classic car Sunday event that had been running throughout the spring and summer. Sadly the weather on Sunday was very disappointing with constant rain, but our residents enjoyed viewing their cars from the dry and warm viewing balconies. Safely inside, the boys enjoyed bacon baps and refreshments. Pictured (L-R): Chris Marter and Andy Marter

We have been so pleased to meet our local classic car communities across the county this year and are looking forward to running next year’s Classic Car Sunday event

Another 5 Star Review!

National Sherry Week

Sherry comes from the area of Spain around the town of Jerez or Xeres, in the southwestern corner of the country. It used to be called Sherish during the 500-year-long Moorish occupation — the word sherry comes from the Moors' word for Jerez.

We talk a lot about enjoying Sherry here at Elgar, and as it is National Sherry Week this week, we tempted our residents to get in on it by enjoying the fortified, and sometimes oxidized wine, from Spain.

To go with our selection of fine Sherries, we paired these with platters of Spanish Tapas (courtesy of Waitrose) while we gave our residents 17 fun facts abut Sherry!

One of the cornerstones of our life enrichment program is cultural exploration with Residents, and by choosing genres such as wine tasting, means that we are able to constantly improve life in our home.

Happy Half Term Halloween!

Residents at Elgar Court Residential Care Home launched their Giant Pumpkin decorating competition to the school communities in Malvern this month.

The Giant Pumpkins were dropped off to local schools by the Elgar Court Care Home team, for the pupils to decorate as they wished. And oh WOW, our residents were overjoyed by the creative decorating skills the schools came up with. The fabulous pumpkins have been admired by residents for both the thoughtful and careful work that have gone into these giants!

Powick C of E school decided to write messages on home made leaves about what autumn means to them and cover their pumpkin, and Lesley and her husband Hugh read through each one! The Downs School in Colwall, made their Pumpkin magical, completing it with a magical wand and lastly, Madresfield Cof E made two goulish pumpkins complete with cobwebs and spiders and scary monsters!

Pictured here with Sarah Cadwallader, Elgar Court's Senior General Manager are Madresfield's Head Boy Callum Wilkes and Head Girl, Jessica Styles. Mrs Hibell, their Headtecher, said, "we would like to thank Elgar Care Home and Barchester for this fun and creative opportunity for our children who attend the after school club".

Strictly Ballroom!

Morning exercises took on an exciting turn today as our residents practised their best ballroom moves. Exercise and having fun goes hand in hand at Elgar Court, and we are always looking for new ways to keep our residents on 'their toes!'

Our Great Pottery Throw Down!

We know that being able to continue lifelong interests or even is a key part of our resident's identities, and we make every effort to encourage and support each resident to be able to do so. In particular, a meaningful one to one with a resident is valuable to see how we can enrich their life further and share memories. Today, residents are enjoying clay modelling and pottery making whilst enjoying each others company.

Malvern College Concert

We were thrilled and delighted to welcome Malvern College to our home this week.

These wonderful and talented pupils provide music recitals and song to entertain our residents. We are very lucky to have such a wonderful community connect with this school, and always look forwards to their concerts. The next event is in November and December, so why not join in with us

Poppy Appeal Coffee morning

This year the organisers behind the national poppy appeal are hoping to raise more than £50 million to support members of the UK’s armed forces community. Each year, they help over 7,000 people from the Royal Navy, Army and the Royal Air Force, with financial and emotional support.

We are always pleased to support and host events to support our veterans, and were delighted to welcome the Malvern Veterans to our event this week and stay for lunch with residents afterwards. Pictured here are Jerry and Liz, Bill and Peter from the Malvern Hills Armed Forces and Veterans Breakfast Club

Pasta Perfecto!

Residents had a fantastic time celebrating World Pasta Day on October 25th, and whipped up a selection of tagliatelle pasta for chef to make into a pasta salad dish.

Everyone had a brilliant time trying out other new shapes and Susan and Hugh couldn't wait to to take part too! We all had great fun talking about our favourite types of pasta and the best accompanying sauces.

Hugh said, "cooking is my favourite hobby and I have always loved Italian food, I don’t think there are many people that don’t! I can't wait to try the pasta salad and I think we should have pasta day every month!”

Autumn Jaunts!

Off our residents go again today, and this time to enjoy the countryside and marvel in the wonderful changing autumn season colours. Having our own minibus gives our residents so much freedom to enjoy life as they want to and of course, sample the local food and services we are lucky to have closeby. Here is Susan and Denise enjoying tea and cake, and Susan has hailed this one of her favourite 'spots' as she said, "they use 'REAL' china which makes drinking tea so much better!" We totally agree Susan!

Afternoon tea and delicious treats!

We visited the Malvern Hills Hotel at British Camp, and enjoyed afternoon tea and desserts in the 18th-century oak lounge bar. Served by amazing staff, residents sampled the desserts, cake and beer and chatted about their life - Trent used to work at Alnwick Castle for most of his life and we were fascinated by his life and work on this english heritage estate.

Carrot cake was the hotel's speciality of the day and Hugh thought it was most delicious! However Lesley and Trent went for the generous portions of chocolate Brownies, and Lesley said, "It's the best chocolate brownie I have ever tasted! Even from our time regularly travelling back and forth to Paris, this is far the best I have ever eaten!".

The afternoon was topped off by a country drive to marvel at the countryside scenes and the changing colours of autumn trees as we drove around Colwall and the Malvern Hills.

Keep learning and make new friends!

Our Community Craft Cafe is now in full swing and some of our residents are knitting away making squares for blankets to send abroad. Learning new skills is always fun in our home and this week, Kerrie our Activities lead (in pink), has learnt how to knit from our skilled residents and showing that passing on new skills between generations is a valuable gift for all of us.

There is a basket in our reception for people wanting to donate knitted squares for Operation Orphan - www.operation-orphan.org

Of course our cafe welcomes all crafting projects, so please do come along and try something new with us - we have paints, modelling clay and much more, so come along and see what takes your fancy and make new friends!

War Time Favourites with the D-Day Dollies!

National Sherry Week

To go with our selection of fine Sherries, we paired these with platters of Spanish Tapas (courtesy of Waitrose) while we gave our residents 17 fun facts abut Sherry!

Poppy Appeal Coffee morning