Murals
Higham hill hut
A resident consultation developed the theme for the mural. With nature and wildlife the preference to reflect the Hut's immediate surroundings there was only one man for the job. Xenz painted the Higham Hill Hut over three days.
The finished mural includes oxes, geese, flowers (specifically poppies), birds and leaves/foliage - the poppies also refer to Remembrance Day, honouring those who have sacrificed themselves to secure and protect our freedom.
joseph tores
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nhs murals
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Pride in the Borough
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Heroes of Wood Street
We want to use public art as a way to raise awareness of cultural icons of Waltham Forest. William Morris is synonymous with Walthamstow, with a gallery in his name located in Lloyd Park. After painting his mural we were approached by residents with the names and stories of more culturally significant people that had links to the area. Since launching this project we have painted murals of Chris Bracey, Madge Gill, Beryl Swain.
paint your london
To promote our crowd fundraising campaign we launched Paint Your London, a fortnight of painting across Walthamstow working with local and national artists. Supported by Fermax, Body Shop, Skyjack, Star Platforms we painted XX murals. Highlights included Invader, Jane Laurie, Frankie Strand and Remi Rough. The campaign was featured on ITV London and London Live with interviews from Mark and Tom who were able to promote the need for more creative workspace in the borough.
bookcase
We were approached by XX who had seen the work of Janis Deman in XX and wanted to bring it to Wood Street who paints realistic bookcases on the side of buildings. With Wood Street Library under threat of being closed, this seemed like the perfect platform to raise awareness of the group campaigning to stop this from happening. Mark had returned from a trip to the USA where he had been able to visit the Rauschenberg Foundation and met XX who XXX. Basing herself in Wood Street Library she invited the public in to select their own book stacks which were then photographed and sent to Janis. He then took these images and used the features of the wall to create a real looking bookcase.
pick your pattern
william morris
-atma
We launched our first pick your pattern in XX. Celebrating William Morris has always been a goal of WSW and after painting a 5x5m portrait of the man himself it was always going to be ATMA to do the job. Securing the gable end wall next to the William Morris gallery was the first coup for the team but when they realised they could not only paint the mural but use it as an opportunity to embrace Morris' quote "Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful."
Working with the William Morris Big Local, they enlisted the help of the HEET project to help locating the right organisation to install side insulation to improve on the home's energy efficiency and also flatten the wall to make it a perfect surface to paint. Retrofit Works and Be Constructive came forward and aided the installation process prior to painting.
A public consultation took place to decide between 6 of Morris' iconic patterns and reached over 1100 votes.
zarah hussain
A chance encounter with Zarah by Mark in 2016 lead to our second Pick Your Pattern campaign in XX. Hussain created six different artworks inspired by Islamic geometry and patterns, inviting the public to vote online for the winning piece. Supported by Amal.
We carried out a consultation with
Madge Gill by Pang
We were approached by to create a commemorative mural of Madge Gill. was a self-taught, visionary artist who created meticulous artworks during her lifetime, many of which reflected her obsession with spiritualism. Her inspired works were often monumental, either in sheer scale or in number. For an untutored artist she skillfully explored different techniques and formats: paints, inks, textiles. Although relatively unknown at the time she is now considered a prolific and powerful artist.
We had been waiting for the right time to work with female street artist Pang and this was the perfect project to collaborate with her. Pang designed 3 options inspired by Gill’s artwork. We unveiled them at the annual Walthamstow Garden Party where people were able to vote on their favourite design of a female local hero.
Workshops
We use our workshop experience to support groups who want to get community participation in a project. We can facilitate focus groups, design sessions, brainstorms, event engagement to help generate design ideas.
Wood Street Studios hosts free creative workshops led by the residents in return for affordable rent. Click here to find out more.
supporting local groups
caravans for refugees
Hundreds of unaccompanied minors and vulnerable families live in tents in an unofficial refugee camp nicknamed 'The Jungle' in Calais, France. Jungle Canopy works with Side By Side Refugees to provide Caravans to serve as temporary shelters for these vulnerable people.
We were asked to help renovate two caravans from an aid convoy, partly in memory of MP Jo Cox, which were sent to Calais.
The caravans were renovated by a local community group and we lined up two female artists, Frankie Strand and Elno, to cover them in artwork — including a Yorkshire rose tribute to the Labour MP.
star wars
Set designer Stuart Freeborn, most notable for his work on Star Wars, was commemorated by a blue plaque being installed on his former home in Leytonstone. To amplify the impact we secured the railway arches on the same road and lined up suitable artists to paint Star Wars themed murals.