Week 6 Bromley meet up

Bromley meet up.

For the last session at the moment with the school we visited the other pop-up in Bromley by Bow

The group travelled across London and really enjoyed the whole experience, they arrived looking quite excited.
I had brought a few of the groups activities but we set up the speaker and lentils and they all seemed really connected to it, it was very hard to get them to not play with it!!!
The other groups seemed intrigued by it as well and after Treehouse had finished everyone had a go and i felt mean turning if off at the end. Again people had started to look for other things to put on the speaker to see what would happen.
One member wasn't impressed that i hadn't set up the microphone and kaosspad!!

It was a great sharing and everyone seemed to enjoy the pop-up space.

I had a little time to chat to the group and the staff and was really surprised at the impact of the sessions, people were asking me if i was coming back next Tuesday which was amazing as at first people were not always aware of what had happened the week before it really helped me to see how the sensory stimulus had been really important and the wildness and playfulness that we had explored together was really valued.

The previous day i had run a session in the pop-up space with 30 year 2 children exploring musical instrument making and story making and it had been great to take the children out of the school environment and into an unknown space that was a bit wild and very playful and run a session. I think the very nature of the pop-up was that it was a place were anything could happen and this made it a very interesting place.

I think the open approach to this Bromley pop-up was very brave but also had created something unique.
Something that would not have existed and something which will leave lasting memories and have an impact on everyone who used it.
In schools and institutions it is very difficult to create playful spaces, it can be very difficult for the staff to feel playful in some places as rooms have multi function, there is a set timetable and outcomes are checked and recorded constantly.
As i said in a previous entry i am used to turning up somewhere working for 6 weeks and disappearing, i don't have to deal with long term discipline, i have outcomes but they are very different to curriculum's, and i am left to my own devices to achieve the outcome.
The pop-up at Bromley was a way for everyone to have that disconnection, it was a great way to create playfulness and wildness. I can appreciate that is was a difficult project to lead and develop, as its hard for people to design something with that much freedom, it is hard to get the initial concept accross. But i think it succeeded in creating a new space, a creative space, one that won't always be there, a transient space that can be a place to hold peoples ideas, to build new communities and new experiences.
And i feel that because of the very nature of the pop-up that the end celebration was what it was all about. It wasn't there a few weeks ago, when it appeared it had no rules or limits, it could be used in many ways, its transience made it playful, and by being there it asked the question 'how can you use me?' which then opens up doorways and possibilities.
So at the end it was great hearing about the different things that had happened from creative sessions with the school to watching films in it by covering it in black out material. And by the end it had a value to lots of people and it was a place of possibilities.
And by being this it was unique.

I think it is a great model for other work in that by creating a new space with possibilities and playfulness a community can start to fill it with their ideas, some which will work and some which will not, and as it it transient the ideas wont be set in stone they can be wild and daring and then at the end people can reveal what they have been up to and then it can disappear, but it will leave behind the concept of playfulness and possibilities. Its not what you do its that you had the chance to do it with a playful mind.
To think outside the box it helps to be able to be outside the box!!!