Walsall is a creative place. From artists, musicians and writers to the skilled craftspeople who helped spark the Industrial Revolution, Walsall people have always had a creative spark.
And in Walsall Creative Factory the borough has a project that exists to feed that creativity, bringing people together, helping them to learn new skills, brightening up their communities and express themselves.
Walsall Creative Factory is a collective of skilled artists and craft experts led by Deb Slade, who has 27 years of experience working in community arts.
Supported by funds, including cash from the Walsall for All government grant, their role includes reaching out to vulnerable, isolated people, as well as helping community cohesion by supporting residents who use English as a second language – using crafts as an entry point to help them engage with the community and each other.
The group moved into their own premises, a former hairdressers’ shop in Westbourne Street, in February last year, providing a place for people to get together and show their creative side.
But the coronavirus pandemic has required Deb, the team and a host of volunteers to show a different kind of creativity – as they worked out ways of helping Walsall folk express their artistic side in their own homes.
The result has been a variety of lockdown-busting creative platforms.
“We have tried to still use the building, almost as billboard to let people know what’s going on,” Deb said, “and for some of our users we’ve stood at the door and talked to them, also bringing activity outside, weather permitting,
“But we’ve also set up six different platforms to help us interact with people and provide projects and ideas to get them creative during the lockdown.
“So, for example, we have a ladies’ chatroom, where our users can just chat away to each other, that has been really quite a lifeline to some more isolated people.
“We’ve used WhatsApp for our youth club – it’s not used for ‘chatting’ in the same way, but we’ve used it to provide a weekly craft project along with delivering packs of materials, which has some educational value.
“Then another example would be our Cultural Dialogue Group, on Facebook, which has been really interesting because it is mainly two groups of women – Asian ladies and Polish ladies – who have been looking at cultural things together.
“So, we’ve managed to use digital platforms to carry on reaching out to people.”
Another way that the Creative Factory has overcome lockdown is to send out regular, simple packs featuring arts projects to challenge users to try new things.
“We have been using Facebook and delivered activity packs to local children in our neighbourhood every three weeks or so, giving ideas on something they can make, and even developed our usual Open Mic night into a virtual online event,” Deb said.
Now, as lockdown eases, the team behind Walsall Creative Factory are considering how to reopen their premises and start working face-to-face with people again.
“Some of our more vulnerable clients have struggled a little more with lockdown, so over the last few weeks we have been considering how to safely start bringing people in again, so that they can see someone,” Deb explained.
“That has either been one-to-one, or two-to-one if they have a carer or helper who comes with them. We’ve also been making packs and delivering them to people’s homes.
“The next step will probably be to open up to four or five people at a time, with everyone wearing masks and observing social distancing. We’re working our way through that now.”
One of the crafts that has been a big success during lockdown is crochet – with users working on a joint project to help brighten up a dull fence outside Caldmore Community Gardens.
The idea is to join clients’ crochet work together into large panels, which can then be weather-proofed, before being attached to the fence.
Similarly, the team has a plan to decorate hoardings at a building site neighbouring their premises with six-foot-tall crocheted flowers.
This kind of colourful thinking has seen the ideas coming out of Walsall Creative Factory help people through the difficulties of the pandemic.
“I think that Walsall is a naturally crafty place,” Deb said, “and I think that during lockdown people have perhaps rediscovered some of the skills they have. We’ve seen it with some of the cards that people have been making and sending to their loved ones, and the artworks that have been created to support the NHS.
“Craft is a great way to relax and unwind too – being creative is therapeutic, and helps people deal with the frustration of lockdown.”
The collective skills of the team and their clients have also contributed directly to the fight against COVID-19, by making PPE supplies.
“We heard that because of all the PPE that NHS staff are having to wear, it can be quite hard to tell what their individual roles are, so we were asked to make some coloured bibs that would help distinguish between them. In the end, we made more than 70 bibs, which went to the Manor Hospital.”
The team has also been asked to make facemasks with windows in them, to help Walsall’s deaf community lipread safely during the pandemic. It’s another crafty challenge they are accepting with relish.
The borough’s workplaces are starting to get back to business. Shops are reopening. Manufacturers’ machines are starting up. Office workers are returning to their desks. Walsall Creative Factory is one place that has been busily turning out its vital product – creativity – throughout the lockdown.