Take a Part

14/07/2026

🗞️ JULY NEWS FROM TAKE A PART: Core Funding, Commission Opps & Spatial Justice!

It has been an incredibly busy month at Take A Part CIO, and our July newsletter is packed with massive milestones, new project launches, and sector opportunities.

If you aren't on our mailing list yet, here is a snapshot of what you missed this month:

🚀 The Big Highlights:
🎉 4 Years of Core Investment: We are absolutely thrilled to share that Take A Part has been awarded a major four-year core grant from the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation! This vital funding gives us the long-term stability to deepen our local impact in Plymouth and scale our community-led cultural democracy models nationally.
🎨 New Commission Opportunity: We are looking for an artist to co-create and completely transform the exterior visual identity and signage for the East End Community Centre, turning it into a vibrant, welcoming neighbourhood landmark in partnership with Barbican Theatre Plymouth. (Deadline: July 27th).
🛹 Drift Tricks Goes to Gloucester: Our skateable sculpture installation is taking over central civic spaces in Gloucester in partnership with CHISSPA for a week of active, creative play and spatial justice, culminating in a Skate Jam & Roller Disco on August 22nd!
📖 East End Echoes (Edition 3): Our summer digital community newspaper is officially live, completely written and led by local residents reclaiming their community narrative.
📊 Democratising Archives Impact Report: The numbers are in! 67 creative workshops reaching over 817 participants to challenge traditional institutional barriers and co-create a brand-new community archive.

⚠️ Back by Popular Demand: Pride in Place Masterclasses!

Following massive demand for our spring bootcamps, we are officially relaunching our Pride in Place series as two condensed, high-impact masterclasses this September:
Sept 9th: Designing Powerful Neighbourhood Boards
Sept 16th: Administrative Bravery & Measuring Impact Spaces are strictly capped to ensure high-quality peer learning.

📧 Don't Miss the Next Update!
From international directory launches (mapping socially engaged art in India!) to the latest sector job openings, we share practical tools, funding insights, and active commissions every single month.

👉 Want to read the full July edition and subscribe so you never miss an update? Check is out here - https://lnkd.in/etac9x5A

And sign up so the Enews hits your inbox each month here - https://lnkd.in/e9dZAsZt

Or send us a message, and we'll send the direct archive link and sign-up page straight to your inbox!

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09/07/2026

Our PRIDE IN PLACE BOOTCAMP is BACK! 🏛️ 🥾 ⛺ 🌟

Following the high demand for our Pride in Place Bootcamp programme in the spring, we are relaunching the programme in September! How do you genuinely devolve power to residents without losing control of the delivery timeline?

The Pride in Place series aims to support local authorities, producers and commissioned organisations to deliver strategically and with value and community benefit from the start of the placemaking programme.

Following the success of our initial series, we are officially relaunching the Pride in Place Bootcamps - reengineered into two high-impact, 3-hour condensed masterclasses this September.

We’ve combined our core modules into 2 comprehensive, tool-packed workshops designed for busy professionals who need actionable strategies now.

📅 Masterclass 1: Designing Powerful Neighbourhood Boards Wednesday, September 9th | 12:30 PM – 3:30 PM
The Focus: Moving past engagement apathy, mapping your community’s hidden assets, and designing a bulletproof resident-led governance framework.
Key Tools: "Mapping the Invisible" asset techniques, Trauma-Informed Placemaking, and the Neighbourhood Board Blueprint.

📅 Masterclass 2: Administrative Bravery & Measuring Impact Wednesday, September 16th | 12:30 PM – 3:30 PM
The Focus: The hard realities of money, risk, and measurement. How to build organisational confidence to share financial control, and how to blend statistics with storytelling to prove hyper-local civic impact to major funders.
Key Tools: "Beyond Bricks and Mortar" capacity budgeting, the Power Sharing Risk Framework, and Co-Created Evaluation Frameworks.

💡 By joining us, you aren't just getting theory - you are walking away with a practical, tested placemaking toolkit to deploy in your neighbourhood immediately.

Spaces are strictly capped to ensure high-quality interactive peer learning and structured workshop facilitation.

🎟️ Secure your place on TicketSource today: https://www.ticketsource.com/take-a-part

06/07/2026

Dance, collage, decision making, conversations, creative writing, drawing, junk modelling- there's something for everyone and lots to enjoy, all for FREE!

Join the community and our partners East End Development Trust Ltd in a whole host of creative activities over the summer.

East End Development Trust Ltd
Arts Council England
The National Lottery Community Fund
The Rank Foundation
Livewell Southwest
Plymouth Sound National Marine Park
Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian
Plymouth Dance

Come and get involved, all welcome. Check out Eventbrite and search east_end_plymouth for more!

03/07/2026

🚨 ARTIST CALL OUT: £5,000 Co-Creation Signage Project in Plymouth 🚨

We are looking for a deeply relational and experienced visual artist, designer, or maker to collaborate with the East End community on a vital new public art and neighbourhood navigation project.

In partnership with Barbican Theatre Plymouth, Take A Part, and East End Arts Action Group, this project aims to radically improve the physical visibility of the East End Development Trust Ltd Community Centre. We want to co-create impactful creative signage, visual pathways, or trail markers that don’t just label a building, but celebrate the true identity, lived stories, and spirit of the neighbourhood.

Supported by the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation Creative Confident Communities fund, this initiative focuses on sustainable, artistic communities. We know the timeline is intended for a quick turnaround, but we refuse to treat community engagement as a transactional, box-ticking exercise. We want a practitioner who knows how to hold space safely, value local knowledge, and build true community ownership within these parameters.

💰 Budget & Scope:

Total All-Inclusive Budget: £5,000 (To cover artist fee for planning/delivery, workshop materials, production, fabrication, and final installation).

Timeline: Fast-track delivery, with an anticipated completion date of September 30th, 2026.

The Project Involves:

🎨 Immersive Co-Design: Facilitating responsive, inclusive workshops that centre local voices, ensuring residents are genuine co-authors of the final signage concepts.

🏢 Materialising Narratives: Translating neighbourhood identity and local stories into a distinct visual landmark and creative talking point to signpost the community to their community centre.

⏳ Navigating Constraints: Working intentionally within a condensed timeframe, keeping the process transparent and protective of both the community’s trust and your own artistic boundaries.

About You:

✔️ A grounded, adaptable visual artist or maker with a strong track record in ethical, socially engaged art practices.

✔️ Experienced in delivering high-quality artistic outputs under tight deadlines without compromising community safeguarding.

✔️ Passionate about systemic community power and equity.

The Logistics:

📅 Application Deadline: Monday, 27th July, 5:00pm

💼 Our Commitment: We value your time. The application process is streamlined to respect your energy—no extensive unpaid labour required upfront.

👉 How to Apply: Send your CV alongside a brief expression of interest (a short cover letter, a 2-minute video, or a 2-minute audio recording) highlighting your relevant experience to [email protected] and [email protected].

Full brief details can be found at: https://www.barbicantheatre.co.uk/jobs-opportunities

30/06/2026

Our final Democratising Archives Evaluation report! Delivered by Take A Part in partnership with the Learning Academies Trust and supported by The National Lottery Heritage Fund, this project worked directly with residents across three Plymouth wards of Efford, St Judes, and Whitleigh to challenge traditional institutional barriers and co-create a new community archive.

Instead of treating community members as passive subjects, this project focused on active representation, authorship, and empowering historically underrepresented groups to curate their own stories.

✨ Project Activities & Reach by the Numbers:

🎬 67 Creative Workshops delivered to 817 participants to collect local stories, photos, and ephemera.
🚌 10 Go See Visits to existing community archives attended by 94 people.
📣 7 Public Community Events reaching 818 people.
🤝 2 Sector Sharing Events bringing together cultural organisations locally at The Box, Plymouth and online across the UK.
🎨 Co-Created Artistic Outcomes: 3 films, 12 story dice, and 1 dance.
🧰 1 Toolkit featuring recommendations back to the wider heritage sector.

The evaluation shows the potential shift in how people view archives, helping participants feel differently about the value of their own stories and re-dressing under-representation in our heritage collections.

A massive thank you to our lead artists, Beth Richards and Tom Goddard, Molly McCarthy, Far Flung and evaluator Lizzie Hilton, and most importantly, the incredible residents who shared their memories and expertise to make this project possible.

👉 Read the full evaluation report and find our sector toolkit here: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1golE_r9sS1Dd3V2HPbJzQjXKszjSmx1E

15/06/2026

There's still time to join us tomorrow for an opportunity to take some time out, slow down, connect and be more mindful.

Join Agnieszka Zajac for a creative session using collage to support wellbeing and self-care

11/06/2026

🌊 Our June E-News is out—and it is officially hitting the waves! 🌊

From national policy changes to hyper-local climate action, this month is packed with major milestones, upcoming toolkits, and opportunities to connect.

Here is what is inside this edition:
🗺️ Ocean Climate Justice in Plymouth: Get the latest updates from our 12-month commission "There is No New Water" and grab your free tickets to our two immersive public workshops happening this weekend (12th & 13th June) and our Toolkit Milestone: our brand-new Creative Civic Ocean Activist Guide is officially written and headed into the design phase for a summer launch! Supported by Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation.

🚨 Last Call for CCCN: Bookings for our inaugural Creative Coastal Communities Network workshop close TOMORROW at 5:00 PM. Don't miss out on an incredible lineup featuring Jonathon Porritt and leading youth advocates. Supported by Esmée Fairbairn Foundation.

🚀 OCI on the National Stage: Celebrating three of our amazing Ocean City Influencers who travelled to Derbyshire to lead filmmaking workshops at the Annual Blue Influencer Conference. Supported by The Ernest Cook Trust.

🏛️ Board Announcements: We are thrilled to formally welcome two brilliant new trustees to the Take A Part team, James McQuaid and Professor Jaana Erkkilä-Hill.

📊 Shaping National Funding: Read about how our community-led blueprints helped inform the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation’s newly released Mid-Strategy Review on place-based creativity.

✨ Catch up on the full issue and subscribe!
🗞️ https://lnkd.in/eB2kF2-p

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10/06/2026

🌊 What does it mean to build truly inclusive ocean cultures? How can young people living on our coastal fault lines actively shape and implement their own climate destinies?

At Take A Part, we believe the answers lie in moving away from overwhelming eco-anxiety and moving toward creative, collaborative, and hopeful ways to co-design better futures.

We are incredibly excited to invite you to the inaugural Creative Coastal Communities Network (CCCN) Webinar.

Join us alongside our core cohort of 18 coastal areas across the UK and Ireland as we explore how to empower young people in coastal settings to lead climate actions rooted in their own ambitions.

We have brought together a phenomenal, diverse lineup of environmentalists, youth advocates, and researchers to spark this vital conversation:

🎙️ Jonathon Porritt (Eminent Environmentalist, Campaigner, and Author of Hope, Anger & Betrayal) on sustaining community energy and will.
🎙️ Cormac McDonagh (Coordinator, Creative Places Balbriggan) on practical frameworks bridging Creative Youth, Creative Industry, and localised Climate Action.
🎙️ Victoria-Emma Westway-Hill (Marine Biology Student & Founding Member, Plymouth Sound National Marine Park Accessibility Working Group) on breaking down barriers to entry and making ocean science accessible.
🎙️ Alan Munro (Founder & Director, Young Sea Changers Scotland) on putting the tools of marine advocacy directly into the hands of the next generation to drive real policy change.

The presentations will be followed by an open panel discussion and a Q&A exploring how coastal communities, researchers, climate justice organisations, and arts venues can collaborate more closely.

Whether you are a researcher, a heritage placemaker, a conservation agency, or an arts venue, we invite you to take part, share your learning, join our widening network of Associate organisations and practitioners and help us create better ocean and coastal futures for the communities experiencing climate injustice most acutely.

🗓️ Date: Monday, 15th June
⏰ Time: 11:00 AM – 1:00 PM BST
📍 Location: Online (Zoom)
🎟️ Cost: FREE (Registration required)
👇 Click the link below to secure your free ticket on TicketSource!

🔗 https://lnkd.in/eBAaKuuA

For questions about the event or to learn more about joining our growing Associate membership, reach out to [email protected].

The Creative Coastal Communities Network is made possible by investment from Esmée Fairbairn Foundation's Our Natural World Programme.

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04/06/2026

We're running a series of free mindful collage sessions designed to support mental wellbeing.

Join artist Aga across June, July and August and take time to slow down, reconnect and use creativity as a tool for self care.

These sessions have been made possible thanks to support from the The Rank Foundation

01/06/2026

🍂 Supporting the Future of Community-Led Creativity Across the UK 🚀

We are proud that Take A Part CIO’s journey and insights helped inform the newly released Esmée Fairbairn Foundation Mid-Strategy Review: Community-led art and creativity (May 2026).

Carried out by DHA Communications, this report highlights the incredible impact that core, unrestricted funding makes when we genuinely trust communities and local artists to lead.

Instead of just looking at numbers-heavy outputs, this review shows how local practice can directly inform funding strategy and national policy.

Since 2020, EF have shifted towards a more community-led, place-based approach to arts funding - supporting work that brings people together, strengthens communities, and creates space for creativity, joy and shared action ✨

The review highlights the difference that core, unrestricted funding can make and reinforces the importance of trusting communities and local artists to lead.

The review challenges foundations and the wider funding ecosystem to do more to back vibrant, confident places by:

📣 Championing community-led creativity over transactional metrics.
🔗 Connecting people and sharing deep learning.
🌱 Supporting stronger networks and R&D across the sector.

We are also thrilled to see our community’s brilliant creative work visually woven into the report, with imagery from our Green Orchestra and Travelling Museum of Communities featured to show what vibrant practice looks like in action! 📸✨

It reinforces a fundamental TAP principle: meaningful change must be locally desired, community-led, and creatively delivered to achieve real sustainability and legacy.

A massive thank you to the research team and to Esmée Fairbairn Foundation for their ongoing commitment to treating grassroots organisations as vital strategic thinkers. We love working with EF!

🔗 https://lnkd.in/e-5AEHnM