An event in a disused shopping centre
On Tuesday 27th August, we held a workshop conversation and film screening on the topic of creative ways of tackling housing needs. This was part of Modern Art Oxford’s Situated Ecologies: Create With Us summer series of workshops. The series brought together choreography, sound, film, textiles and sensory play; “celebrating the people and places that fuel our civic imagination”. We’re all about utilising underused space, and we jumped at the opportunity to engage in this temporary adaption of a disused shopping centre, the Clarendon Centre. The pavilion was created by Harold Offeh (entitled ‘Pavilion’); a beautiful, colourful space for exchange, relaxation and reflection.
From film to conversations
We held a 2-hour workshop where we started with a film screening of a documentary called ‘Nubia Way: A Story of Black-Led Building in Lewisham’, which captures the story of a self-build cooperative building 13 sustainable timber frame houses in the 1990s. As we all sat and enjoyed the film, everyone was encouraged to jot down any questions or ideas on post-it notes for a conversation we would have afterwards.
We touched on several topics during our conversation including:
- Why aren’t more self-build schemes like this happening in the UK?
- What would it look to begin a community-led campaign on affordable housing? And if we brought this campaign to major landowners in and around Oxford?
- What creative ways could we address the housing crisis?
We each took time sharing our different perspectives and having a lively conversation in thinking about this topic in relation to housing and homelessness as well as affordability.
At Transition by Design, we are focused on addressing social and environmental issues, and we are particularly passionate about affordable housing. We hope to engage in further workshops ion the future with others around the community on this topic. So watch this space!
