Holiday Greetings from CLEAR VILLAGE! From meeting amongst stunning white-frosted trees in Bedfords Park to mingling for interviews with holiday shoppers and shopkeepers on Tottenham’s high street, from watching picturesque ice flows on Regent’s Canal to holiday celebrations and openings at Victoria and the Lime Wharf RECODE Gallery, CLEAR VILLAGE has certainly enjoyed a festive end of 2012, and we send you warm tidings and raise our glasses to toast the successes of 2012 and wish you and yours a happy and prosperous 2013!
WALLED GARDEN IS GO!
BEDFORDS PARK WALLED GARDEN PROJECT RECEIVES MAJOR GRANT!
We’re pleased to announce that following the initial hand-off by Friends of Bedfords Park and eighteen months of hard work, CLEAR VILLAGE has received major funding from the Big Lottery, Local Food Grant!
The funds will be used to:
Restore the historic garden wall perimeter.
Establish community food growing grounds for learning how to grow and cook local food.
Create a teaching garden environment for school children to learn about food cycles, nature’s operation, and urban sustainability.
We’ve had our first steering committee meeting and the site clearing and build of the garden paths has already begun! We’ve also had three inspiring days of walled garden origami wishes workshops for almost three hundred local school children by celebrated artist, Naomi Kashigami.
We are grateful for the strong support of the Council of Havering, and in particular Simon Parkinson, the Head of Parks Culture and Leisure, and Martin Stanton, the Head of Parks.
Onward!
TOTTENHAM ALLEY LINKS
COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT IN TOTTENHAM
The Tottenham High Road (see a map here) was the epicentre of the summer riots in 2011, and CLEAR VILLAGE has been selected by Design Council/ CABE and theFriends of Down Lane Park to orchestrate a deep collaboration with the community to address the unsafe, untidy, and discouraging alleyways that link a heavily-used stretch of the High Road with the residential neighbourhoods to the east.
The first phase of the project is a street survey to understand what local people think of the alleys and what sort of improvements they would like to see. Building on the results of the survey, a series of workshops will be held where local residents, shop keepers, community groups, and local authorities will work together on a strategic plan for the alleys. This plan will then be taken forward by the Friends of Down Lane Park to achieve big-impact changes for the area.
We hope that we you will be able to join us for part or all of the series. You can already register your interest to participate here.
DYNAMIC DIALOGUES III
CO-VISIONING 2035 IN HELSINGBORG
We were back in Helsingborg at the end of November for the third and final Lab of the Dynamic Dialogues series. It was dark and stormy outside, but in true Dickensian fashion the room inside was lit up with smiles. We were building on the experiences and results from the first two Dynamic Dialogues and linking that up with the City’s efforts to develop a vision for 2035. Our goal was to elaborate on the cultural aspects of a generative, vibrant, shared, global and balanced city; and the day was designed first to create a dreaming space and then to distil this into actionable plans.
The participants, who came from all walks of life, proved to be great strategists and at the end of the day we had three compelling scenarios. One revolved around turning the main transport hub into a culture hub as well; another focused on making institutional culture more mobile by means of a culture bus which would dramatically increase the reach of both audiences and performances; the last aimed to build a vision of creativity without conflict and consisted of a system of innovative approaches to our cultural heritage, like offering conflict-free action films. We’ll publish our report at the beginning of 2013 and look forward to continuing to feed in to Helsingborg’s vision, 2035 and beyond!
Full project description, click here and more on Helsingborg’s vision here.
MAKE YOUR SQUARE
HACKNEY 27th OCTOBER
On a beautiful, clear and crisp Saturday morning in Hackney, CLEAR VILLAGE and CIVA joined the community of Regent Estate and members of the Tenants and Residents Association for a day of design and making at Workshop 44. The plan for the day was simple; get together to share, exchange and have some fun while designing for the outside space, baking bread and discussing micro-grants for hyper-local projects.
The day was a wonderful success, and it started, as all good work events do, with coffee. Get the donated coffee machines working, then find the right-sized filters and ground coffee. Our fearless intern took up the call with the help of others including none-other than grammy-award winner, Imogen Heap, and world renowned artist, Alexa Meade, and the black-gold soon flowed to ward off the morning chill. (… read the rest of the story here )
WORKSHOPS & EVENTS
SMALLWORKS – VICTORIA OPENING
Over discussion and drinks, Small Works, a collaboration between CLEAR VILLAGE and CIVA, celebrated the launch of its freshly regenerated space on Vauxhall Estate, Victoria. With forty residents and social entrepreneurs passing through for a jolly good natter and nibble, all enjoyed sharing gifts and stories and brainstorming initiatives for the new space.
To communicate possibility and precedent, the space hosted an exhibition of visuals, quotes, and the Well-Being Analysis results from its sister project Small Works Hackney, which kicked off on Regent Estate earlier in the year. Alongside festive decorations and a boastful spread of canapés, the Vauxhall Estate map was sketched out and read, ‘Imagine your Neighbourhood….’ facilitating a freedom for expression of personal aspirations for the neighbourhood. The evening’s welcoming vibe reflected community cohesion which lies at the heart of all Small Works!
OUT & ABOUT
CYCLE OF GLOBAL LEADERSHIP
Sir Michael Barber defines the Cycle of Global Leadership: Economic Growth -> Economic Influence -> Global Leadership -> Innovation -> Economic Growth ->
WELCOME
WELCOME INTERNS JAMES BRADY & NATALYA WELLS!
JAMES BRADY – ASPIRING ARCHITECT. CYCLIST. MAPPER.
James grew up in South Wales and completed a Foundation in Art before going on to study Architecture at Cardiff University. He is passionate about low-energy design and worked for Habitat for Humanity in New Jersey to help clients achieve Passivhaus energy standards. He is also deeply interested in mapping and visualising urban information to identify the socio-economic issues that affect the urban condition. Finally, he loves cycling and recently completed a 220-mile charity bike ride in Wales in a day. At CLEAR VILLAGE, James hopes to work on local solutions that benefit the larger scale.
Natalya grew up in London. She spent four years living in Edinburgh studying English Literature and Art History whilst writing restaurant and book reviews for magazines. She first became interested in urban placemaking after writing about the relationship between physical space and emotional place in the context of developing postcolonial cities and their literature. Having recently returned to London, she is looking forward to becoming part of urban regeneration projects with Clear Village.
