Transition Town Tooting

Tag: Welcoming Signs Partnership

  • What’s happening with the knitted bees of Tooting? – Update #2 on our partnership project with CARAS

    We’ve enjoyed and learned so much from our partnership project with CARAS which has been running since spring 2015.
    Here’s Update #2 on one more of the project strands – this one involving the CARAS Women’s Group for refugees and asylum-seekers. We shared Update #1 a fortnight ago – read it here.

    The knitted honeybees of Tooting
    It’s not often you can ask “what’s happening in the world of Tooting’s knitted & crocheted bees?” We’ve been busy since spring 2018 on a fascinating quest that started with our beekeeper friend Richard who is Chair of the London Beekepers Association asking “Do you know anyone who could make some model bees as teaching aids? Toy bees available online are all hopelessly inaccurate…we need about 50…”
    I immediately said “yes!” and a new project was born…which has developed to include the CARAS Family Day and Women’s Group, a wonderful local group of knitters, beekepers and TTT.

    It’s been so moving to us all that this novel partnership has come together: local craftspeople with experience and skill plus refugee women with skills and desire to create plus our own TTT colleagues. We’ve got together for the interest and challenge, in order to work with a London-wide group’s own fascinating project in an imaginative way.

    Attaching wings and legs at the CARAS Women’s Group

    Richard and the LBKA are developing participative classes for schools. The bee models would need to have the correct number of legs (6), eyes (5) and wings (4), with antennae (2) in just the right place on their heads (“not like antlers and not like whiskers”), triangular downward-facing heads, a waist: all giving the general look of a honeybee with correct details while also being imaginative prompts for LBKA workshops. The bees should definitely not have cartoon smiles.


    We chatted: Jane suggested crochet or knitting rather than sewing; Nicola knew just the right people – a group of Knitters and Natterers including Margaret, Dora, Joan and Mandie who regularly make dozens of stuffed textile toys for local charities. Co-ordinated by Margaret, we settled on finger puppet bees and over 50 bee bodies were knitted and crocheted. Margaret created patterns and templates for the bee parts – a first for her (maybe a first in London?).

    Dora
    Joan

    Samples were made and adjusted and tried out in LBKA pilot school workshops where children took on the diverse roles of honeybees: exploring, doing the waggle-dance, foraging & more.
    Richard visited a CARAS Family Day session in the Tooting Community Garden where many of the Women’s Group participants were present with their families. He took along an observation bee hive, local honey to sample and talked about individuals’ own experience of bees.

    Mandie
    Margaret & Nicola

    The final phase of making took place this month in the CARAS Women’s Group where Margaret facilitated 50+ bee puppets having their wings and legs cut out of gauze or felt and sewn on by the refugee and asylum-seekers at the group. One woman said that she was pleased to be ‘helping educate about bees and honey’. Many of the women would like to do more knitting and crochet. (And so could the CARAS Youth Club. Our session a year ago making macrame plant pot holders was very popular with young men and women both).

    At one level when we have been occupied in the project we take it for granted – this is how we do things, how TTT  promotes community participation, creativity, fun and problem-solving. 
    Then, perhaps when we’re explaining this to someone new, we realise “Wow! This is an amazing experience…all this sharing for the love of it, sustained over 10 months. That’s a world I like to be part of!”

    Plus we know we are all contributing to people of all ages learning about honeybees, pollination and the value of protecting habitats and growing bee-forage plants in the city. LBKA’s tagline is ‘What’s good for bees is good for people’.

    Thinking about bee puppet materials: most materials used have been ‘in stock’ in the makers’ sewing boxes and cupboards. Margaret produced mosquito netting for bees’ wings that she had saved since working in Africa 40 years ago. Ditto her vintage Shamrock brand Irish linen carpet thread. We found wool and more at the Work & Play Scrapstore.

    Jeni

    Nothing new has been purchased. The bee puppets have been created out of the love of making and sharing.
    If you are inspired to take part the CARAS + TTT projects – perhaps offering good ideas or simply your time, sharing specialist skills, as a donor in kind, as a partner group – you are very welcome to contact Chuck at TTT by email here.
    Over 40 individuals and 15 local organisations locally have contributed to the partnership in many ways over the past 4 years.
    Thanks to everyone involved so far! – Chuck

  • Eco-checking, a memorial bench, school planters, knitted bees and Jellybrella – 2019 Update #1 on our partnership project with CARAS

    We’ve enjoyed and learned so much from our partnership project with CARAS which has been running since spring 2015.
    Here’s a short update on several of the strands – taking the first three in the list above, each of which has involved the Youth Club for asylum-seekers and refugees. We’ll share Update #2 soon.

    As ever, if you are inspired to contribute to the projects – offering good ideas or simply your time, sharing specialist skills, as a donor in kind, as a partner group – you are very welcome to contact Chuck at TTT by email here.
    Over 40 individuals and a dozen local organisations locally have been involved with the TTT + CARAS partnership in many ways over the past 4 years.

    Eco-Checking the CARAS offices
    CARAS has achieved a gold standard London Youth Quality Mark for carrying out participatory and youth-led eco-check of activities across 3 sets of sustainability criteria: Energy & Water; Healthy Living and Litter & Waste. Helped by Egle from CARAS and Sara from TTT, a team of young people identified relevant issues and then analysed how well the organisation as a whole deals with the challenges.

    The intention was not to blame, but to make an action plan for ‘things to change and put right’ as well as ‘things we do well already…and so we should keep doing them!’

    Examples from the action plan:

    • stop purchasing single use plastics for the many meals that are prepared as part of the CARAS programmes
    • renew the planting boxes outside the offices for 2019 so that we’re growing what we might like to eat, and so that there are beautiful plants that are welcoming, that we like and that are good for pollinating insects

    Here are the brand new colourful plates, bowls and cutlery which will be used again and again at CARAS and on Family Days at other local venues.
    You’re welcome to read the eco-check detail – click here.
    It’s admirable because it is short, practical and understandable, and transferable to many other community voluntary settings.

    Congratulations to the multi-language group who came together in Tooting to put the eco-check together!


    Benches and Planters
    Since last summer we’ve been designing and making a bench for The Spires, a local charity working with homeless people. The bench is a memorial to past users of The Spires who have died.

    That’s an example of this whole past year’s priority with CARAS young people: to engage them directly with community groups with needs that the youth club can respond to with energy, skills and creativity.
    It’s been a fascinating design and build experience. Later we’ll share a summary of the project from model making onwards, showing how many hands have been able to contribute.

    The final stage is to add the names of the people for whom the bench is a memorial, and this is being done using laser-cut adhesive copper tape.
    TTT’s bench project co-ordinator Dermot says:
    “It’s moving and humbling to see the young people taking such care with typefaces and the fiddly details necessary in order to a high-impact bench which celebrates people they have never met. Seeing the bench all the way through to completion over months of work is a big achievement”.

    The next project that we’ll do with the Youth Club is another example of a local group ‘reaching in’ to engage with CARAS young people alongside their own team. Chestnut Grove Academy want to create set of planters located right at their newly-created entrance – perhaps to grow ingredients for Food Tech, perhaps to make a quiet space for the Library which looks out on the site, certainly to create a beautiful space. The school wants to commission these planters in an original and creative way.

    The entrance to Chestnut Grove, with the site on the left.

    We’ll be facilitating CARAS young people to work on site with the school community including parents and students. This is a new challenge – for for the first time in 4 years of our build projects we won’t be doing mobile carpentry on the steps of the Hall at Derinton Road!

    In our next update we’ll share news on knitted bees and Jellybrella. We look forward to teasing your interest and sharing details. – Chuck

  • Join us at the London National Park City Fair on 21st July to co-create a Greener, Healthier and Wilder London!

    We’re thrilled to be invited to contribute to the London National Park City Fair on Saturday July 21st 11:00 – 5:00 – all the details here.

    The purpose of the Fair is to celebrate’s London’s potential to be Greener, Healthier and Wilder.
    Two dozen stands & an A-Z of short talks will show how that potential can be an imagined & achieved right now.

    Our stand focuses on our partnership projects and facilitation since 2015 with CARAS the Tooting charity who work with refugees and asylum-seekers: all about social sustainability in the community.

    We’ll be sharing our thoughtful, creative and fun Signs of Welcome making workshop – come and join in: any ages, any languages welcome and you can take your signs home to brighten up your neighbourhood.

    We’ll share 5 short case studies that explore our work in partnership with CARAS beneficiaries, and explore options with stand visitors who are interested to get involved as volunteers.
    You can read the case studies here.

    There’s also a more formal description of the history and impact of the partnership since 2015 – read it here.

    Finally on sharing learning, there’s an article on our Stay With Love pallet-benches on the London National Park City website in the Making a Difference section here.

    We’ll have a prize draw to attract a lucky winner plus family or friends to Tooting for a Taste of Tooting experience! You’ll enjoy our diverse food culture, try recipes from CARAS participants and cook on an open fire on the Tooting Community Garden. Here’s a copy of the prize draw details: you have to come along to the Fair to enter!

    Please join in the fun of the Fair and meet us at the stand – we look forward to seeing you and we’re proud to be contributing alongside so many fascinating London groups.

  • All welcome to join in locally with our next five creative & thoughtful ‘Signs of Welcome’ workshops

    Our Signs of Welcome series of ten local workshops is continuing now over the next two weeks.
    Click here to read about the first five events and what we experienced together with our project partner CARAS.

    We created these participatory workshops to provide a vivid, simple and accessible opportunity to imagine how to welcome people new to the community and then make decorative signs to take away. 
    The workshops are for all ages and are free, fun, thoughtful and creative. 

    Each workshop runs in a great local venue which offers the space for all comers to join in. Thank you to all the venues for partnering with us and supporting the project.

    Signs of Welcome workshops in diverse places!

    The remaining workshops (all details on the TTT Events Calendar here on the blog):

    > Paradise Co-operative Garden, Earlsfield
       Sat 9th June, 10:00-12:00
     
    > St Mary Magdalene Church, Trinity Road, Tooting
       Weds 13th June, 4:00-5:30
     
    > Sprout Community Arts, Furzedown
       Fri 15th June, 4:00-5:30 

    > The Migration Museum, Vauxhall
       Thurs 21st June, 6:00pm-7:45pm 
       Part of a drop-in evening of events at the Museum, 
       all celebrating Refugee Week

     

    As we’ve run the events, new features have emerged. 
    Recently we offered the workshop at a Family Visit Day in Wandsworth Prison. With four walls surrounding participants, the signs they created became a way to imagine new welcomes and relationships. One adult’s sign simply stated ‘Kids Matter’. A family created a sign together, a graphic recording of a live and positive conversation between themselves.

    Our introductory script has developed. 
    Now we’re also saying “you can create signs to put up in the city spaces where you live – signs that don’t just label places or limit us (‘keep off the grass’ or ‘no ball games’). They’re about welcoming people and what we value when we get together”

    All welcome, all ages can join in 
    and each workshop is different!

     Many thanks for funding support from ThriveLDN, an initiative by the Mayor Of London.

  • The simple invitations of our ‘Signs of Welcome’ workshops have brought vivid, compelling and complex results. More to come, please join in!

    It’s TTT’s tenth anniversary, and we’re facilitating ten free, fun, thoughtful and creative ‘Signs of Welcome’ workshops locally, along with our partner CARAS. We’re in diverse venues that are themselves welcoming and interesting spaces to visit: cafes, shops, local enterprises.
    We’re half way through – five workshops completed since March and five more in the next few weeks.  
    All welcome! 
    See the TTT events calendar for all the dates and details. 

    The NEXT ‘Signs’ workshop is in the wonderful surroundings of the Wandsworth Oasis shop at Amen Corner on Friday 1st June from 4:00-5:30. 
    That’s at 234-250 Mitcham Rd, Tooting SW17 9NT.
    Have you ever done a creative workshop in a shop? Was it as amazing a place as the Amen Corner Oasis shop? You’ll have time to browse….and it’s half term, so all the family can join.

    We have lots of ‘Signs’ in many languages – all responding to this open question: “What would you like to say to welcome people who are new to the community?”
    They’ve been fascinating sessions which everyone seems to appreciate. Expressing ourselves, meeting others, making it visual and being creative by ‘thinking with our hands’ is a very powerful mix.
    A brilliant and valuable extra is that young people from the CARAS youth club have been joining in to gain volunteering experience co-facilitating a creative community session. 
    There’s been inspiring communication across the cakes and mint tea on the cafe tables. Young people who are refugees and asylum-seekers have enjoyed friendly venues they may not have considered visiting, and met many local people they would not otherwise have encountered.  

    Throughout there’s been interwoven threads of self-expression plus a two-way invitation to ask questions and share experiences.


    We have a vivid record of the sessions in the shape of the Signs themselves. They’ll be included in a local exhibition during Refugee Week, June 18th-24th: details to come. The materials for the Signs are re-purposed from publicity boards from the wonderful Work and Play Scrapstore. We had one of our workshops there, and met this Japanese architect who joined in (with a translation on the back):
    These workshops are part of our partnership with CARAS throughout 2018 – the partnership purpose throughout the year will be to facilitate events which draw refugees and asylum-seekers and the local community closer together. For more about the year’s projects, please click here, and there are lots of pictures on our TTT Facebook pages. 
    Many thanks to the partnership funder ThriveLDN, an initiative by the Mayor Of London .


  • ‘Signs of Welcome’ free, creative, hands-on & local workshops from March to June 2018

    In March we started our run of ‘Signs of Welcome’ creative workshops, and between now and June we’re offering more public hands-on events with local project partners. 

    In the workshops you’ll explore your responses 
    to this open question: 
    “What would you like to say to welcome people who are new to the community?”
    You’ll imagine what message you would like to say to refugees, asylum-seekers or others new to the community.
    You’ll design and create signs to express your message.
    You can take them home or loan them to us for exhibition during Refugee Week in June.

    The next two events are in the Easter holidays:

    Date:  Wednesday 11th April  
    Venue: Tartine Artinasal
    9 Upper Tooting Road, Tooting Bec, SW17 7TS 
    Timings: 4:00 pm to 5:30 pm

    Date:  Friday 13th April 
    Venue: Home Community Cafe
    St Andrew’s Earlsfield, Garratt Lane SW18 4SR
    Timings: 1:00 pm to 2:30 pm
    What to expect: 
    • All welcome to join us for a free, facilitated and fun crafts workshop using re-purposed materials – we’ll provide everything you need 
    • Design and create your own messages of welcome to people new to the community
    • Adults and children will all enjoy the workshop 
    • No need to book
    • We’ve included weekends and afternoons after school to allow children and families to take part together 
    • Take the signs home, or leave them with us for exhibition during Refugee Week in June 2018
    • Workshop run by Transition Town Tooting and CARAS (the Tooting charity serving refugees and asylum-seekers)

      Thanks to our local partner the Work and Play Scrapstore in Tooting, the signs will always be made using materials saved from going to waste. 

      Write your signs in any language!
      Design a message using both sides of your sign!

      Many thanks to all the local partners hosting free Signs of Welcome workshops, including:

      • Fridays March 10th & 23rd. The Sound Lounge, Wimbledon

      • Wednesday April 11th. Tartine Artinasal, Tooting Bec

      • Friday April 13th. Home Community Cafe, Earlsfield

      • Friday June 1st. Wandsworth Oasis shop, Amen Corner

      • Saturday June 9th. Paradise Co-operative, Earlsfield

      • Friday June 15th. Sprout Community Arts, Furzedown
      We’ll share the details of each workshop closer to the time. 

      This project is a strand of the 2018 Welcoming Signs partnership between TTT and CARAS and local venues and other supporters. The purpose throughout the year will be to facilitate events which draw refugees & asylum-seekers closer together with the local community.

    • Funding awarded for 2018 ‘Welcoming Signs’ partnership with CARAS. Plus: new creative community workshops running March-May.

      We’re planning the fourth year of TTT’s partnership with CARAS the Tooting charity working with refugee and asylum-seekers. 
       
      We’re thrilled that the partnership has been awarded funding for 2018 from Team London and Thrive LDN’s ‘Young London Inspired’ fund: “improving the lives and mental health of young Londoners by helping them to volunteer”.

      So, in 2018 one of our main focus areas will be enabling young people from CARAS to volunteer in the community. That means working with young people to imagine and design what they could contribute locally and what benefit that would have, as well as carrying out the voluntary time.

      The whole 2018 young people’s partnership is called ‘Welcoming Signs’. Many elements of our CARAS project involved community benefit and relationships in the past: for example these pallet-benches made with the CARAS Youth Club with welcoming invitations written in many languages had starring roles at TTT’s Tooting Twirl in July 2017:

       

      We’re fortunate and grateful that several local partner organisations in Tootings have been ‘reaching in’ to CARAS, seeking and offering voluntary projects. 
      We’ll share more very soon on the range of activities we’re exploring. 

      Plus we’ll continue to work through 2018 with other age groups served by CARAS: families, the women’s group, adults.

      The first community events with young people from CARAS included as contributors are starting in the next few weeks: on March 16th and 23rd we’re facilitating Signs of Welcome workshops across the border in Wimbledon, at The Sound Lounge pop-up venue. 
      It’s the same event run two times. 
      Six other local venues have agreed to offer more Signs of Welcome sessions between March and May as project partners. 
      The materials from the ‘Signs’ will always be re-purposed, saved from going to waste. Thanks to another partner, the Work and Play Scrapstore in Tooting for your support!

       

      The details: Signs of Welcome creative workshops this March

      “What would you like to say to welcome people who are new to the community?”

      Dates: Friday 16th March & Friday 23rd March
      Venue: The Sound Lounge, 8 The Broadway, Wimbledon SW19 1RE
      Timings: 4:00 pm to 5:30 pm
      What to expect: (download the flier here)

      o   All welcome to join us for a free, facilitated and fun crafts workshop using re-purposed materials – we’ll provide everything you need

      o   Create your own messages of welcome to people new to the community. You can write in any language!

      o   Take the signs home, or leave them with us for exhibition during Refugee Week in June 2018

      o   Adults and children will all enjoy the workshop

      o   We’ve chosen afternoons after school to allow children and families to take part together

      Tooting friends are welcome to come over to Wimbledon to enjoy the first workshops and the familiar faces at The Sound Lounge.

      Please contact Charles by email here if you have any queries. Up-to-date news on the workshops will be on TTT’s facebook page & shared by twitter.