Post by Emma Newman.

​On Saturday May 12th, EDP supported Bow Church to host ‘Bow Moves’ – a community event exploring potential uses of their building. The afternoon explored the possibility of forming new connections with local organisations and businesses, prompting them with the question “What would you do with this space?”

The competition format helped test the appetite for Bow Church as a venue to hire, gain insight into the limitations of the space, and encourage groups to explore new activities that can serve the community. Once the applications came in, EDP helped Bow Church select two winners. In the end, Bow Church hosted Angelique Sinclaire’s Latin Dance and Vera’s Karate Academy for a day themed around fitness and physical activity. On top of that, an arts and crafts station was set up where participants could decorate images of the church.

As an intern at the Glass-House, this event was a great opportunity to experience what community engagement looks like. Over the past couple weeks of my internship, I have participated in conversations about the Bow Church project, and community engagement in general. I found that attending this event was an invaluable experience, allowing me to put faces to everyone involved in the project and have meaningful conversations with community members.

The event attracted churchgoers, regular Latin dance and karate club attendees as well as curious passers-by. It was thrilling to see all these groups come together, chat over tea and cake and share the space. All were enthusiastic to see the church being put to use in such novel ways.

The classes were a great success, and the event scaled up significantly throughout the day with a steady influx of people.

Thanks to movable chairs, it was possible to open a large open space in the centre of the nave. Both activities were easy to set up so the transition between the two classes happened seamlessly - a testament to the multi-use potential of the space.

Participants responded well to the day overall and gave constructive written feedback at the end of the event. These included: “Very enjoyable afternoon. Certainly would attend again”, “It was great having the arts and crafts as well as both classes. More please!.” These responses were very encouraging and confirmed that Bow Church’s efforts to put their space to new uses are headed in the right direction. A regular church goer commented that they never would have tried this sort of class anywhere else. Whilst we often consider how fresh uses can bring new people into a building, it’s worth contemplating how enabling a building to thrive with new activity can enable new opportunities for regular users of the space too.

Participants also suggested other activities that Bow Church could host. Art, music, pilates, reading groups, knitting and language classes were all brought up as activities they would like to see happen at the church. Some local residents were inspired by events at other churches they had attended and saw how those ideas could be translated to Bow Church.

Constructive criticism, such as “more open space to dance,” “café,” “another toilet,” “heating,” was invaluable feedback for the church’s ongoing renovation work. This was especially relevant to them when considering how to enable a variety of activities to ensure their church stays relevant and useful to the community.  

Overall, ‘Bow Moves’ was a heart-warming event, holding much promise for future use of Bow Church. It was fantastic to witness the connections people made to the church and to each other.

Emma Newman is a summer intern with the Glass-House Community Led Design.

post by Sophia de Sousa, The Glass-House Community Led Design

Sometimes, when a community-based organisation is looking after a building, the challenges of the everyday can be overwhelming. This is particularly true when the building must cater to a variety of different needs and users and when it is in need of refurbishment. When the heritage of the building is significant as well, this adds another layer of complexity. For those looking after historic places of worship, all of these considerations must be managed, while respecting the needs and practices of their faith community.

Last month, as part of the Empowering Design Practices (EDP) research project, we invited three community-based groups to take part in our Design Training course, to help them build skills and confidence in design, and to do some practical work exploring how design could help them make the most of the specific buildings they manage.

The groups who took part look after buildings that are home to both faith-based and community activities and services. These groups, the United Reformed Church in Stratford-upon-Avon, St. Mary’s Church, Bow in east London, and the ISRAAC Somali Community and Cultural Association in Sheffield, are all at a moment where they are looking at the potential of their building, and how it can support their vision for the future.
At the Glass-House, we have seen that exploring the design of a building, both in its present form and in imagining its future, can be a powerful tool for looking past those everyday challenges and unlocking its potential as a place that helps people thrive. The process of rediscovering what the building has to offer can also be hugely empowering for the people involved.

Within the EDP research team, we were keen to explore whether getting back to the basics of how buildings work and the design of their buildings could help groups looking after historic places of worship to think differently about them. To do this, we used our Glass-House Buildings by Design training programme, with the support of our long-time Enabler and EDP consultant, Leo Care, who hosted us at the University of Sheffield Arts Tower.

Learning from and through design
The training took the groups through an intensive hands-on series of steps, which included an introduction to design principles and processes, mapping, visioning and model-making. The training also included site visits to three local buildings that have been transformed, which were hosted by the groups that had led the refurbishment process and who now manage those buildings.

The design training offered an important space for our groups to look at their buildings through a new lens. Meeting other groups and projects faced with similar issues and challenges, and learning about some of the solutions they had found, was both encouraging and inspiring. The groups also looked at completed refurbishments with a critical eye, considering the aspects they found more or less relevant and applicable to their own buildings and communities.

Making models of their own buildings also revealed a great deal. Our groups started to look at their buildings as a living thing. They looked at how the spaces fit together, at the different qualities of the various parts of the buildings. They considered our journey through buildings and how design can shape our experience of a place.

We tested various ideas for how they could use design to help transform their buildings. The groups found that small changes could potentially make a big difference to how a space is used, and how people relate to it. Working with the models helped the groups take a more holistic look at their buildings, and clearer visions for the future began to emerge.

At the end of the two intensive days, the groups felt buoyed by the qualities of their buildings and the potential that they could now see in them. One participant admitted that she had felt anxious and a bit reluctant to build a scale model of her church, but that doing it had helped her understand the building differently, and in a strange way, to fall back in love with it.

We look forward to seeing how these groups further develop their ideas and how design can help empower them to enhance their buildings.

Reposted from the Glass-House blog (13 October 2016)