MEDWAY is building on the talents of Zandra Rhodes and Karen Millen to become a hub of creative industry.

The place that nurtured these internationally-acclaimed fashion designers has a new one-stop shop near Sun Pier, Chatham, to encourage the creation of new business and the expansion of existing ones.

Medway Enterprise Gateway specialises in creative business, capitalising on the presence of the local specialist college Kent Institute of Art and Design (KIAD), as well as more than 750 local companies in the creative field.

The Gateway helps students and graduates implement their good ideas locally with the hope that these new businesses will grow and generate new jobs.

It is backed by the South East England Development Agency (SEEDA), Medway council, Business Link Kent, KIAD and North Kent Chamber of Commerce.

SEEDA is injecting £250,000 over three years into the project, with others together contributing a similar sum. Backers believe that half a million pounds will prove cost-effective in generating new businesses for Medway.

The Gateway headquarters has workstations equipped with laptop computers and telephone links to help would-be entrepreneurs.

The Gateway, whose champion is Jay Choudhry, the founder of Puretone, an award-winning hearing aid manufacturer on Medway City Estate, will be open in the evenings and weekends. Membership is free.

Gateway director Alastair Dean, a design graduate who was previously with GlaxoSmithKline, said it was important to make is user-friendly.

He said: “Medway has got a lot going for it. We want to see this place buzzing and we want to see it buzzing not just with people who are setting up in business themselves but engaging businesses that are already established.''

He has already spoken to creative businesses in Chatham Historic Dockyard about mentoring the new business people.

Medway Enterprise Gateway is one of 20 gateways being set up across the South East, four of them in Kent.