FRESH VISIONS x MALLYDAMS

Fresh Visions supports children, young people and adults who face extreme disadvantage as a result of poverty, domestic abuse, lack of education and social exclusion. Mallydams is a well established RSPCA run wildlife rehabilitation centre, education centre and 55 acre woodland nature reserve just outside of Hastings.
In May ’24 we were commissioned to devise a creative/ educational project that would join the 2 organisations. 
We have worked with Fresh Visions on several occasions facilitating workshops for the young people that use their services and involving them in a number of our projects such as for Hastings Storytelling Festival. On this occasion the team approached us to come up with a concept for a collaborative project that would build awareness around wildlife that can be found in both locations relevant to the two organisations – the Broomgrove housing estate and Mallydams woodland nature reserve.

Our starting point for the project was spirit animals in the sense of asking the young people to think about association and perceived characteristics of animals that may be found at both locations, for example a clever and cunning Fox, and how it may relate to their own personalities or those of other members of the group. This process served to warm the young people to the idea of animals they may have preconceptions about and to familiarise themselves with the animals habits and habitats.

The second stage of the project involved us spending time at Mallydams with the young people and exploring the woods and discovering which animals inhabit both environments. The young people made bug hotels to take back to their estate and place them in areas they thought were suitable and they choose animal masks to colour in and decorate.

The third stage was to consolidate the connection between the locations and to leave a lasting legacy for the project on the estate where the children live. Once the animals of significance had been identified and highlighted by the young people we designed an interconnected ‘totem’ to be placed on the local community centre. We cut out the animal head shapes in wood and primed them then took them to the young people’s regular Friday evening meet up and over a couple of sessions engaged them in decorating the heads. To finish the project the young people watched us attach their artworks to an exterior of the community centre for all the residents to see. We were warned that the heads would probably be vandalised and attempts would be made to pull them off the wall but as yet they remain untouched and intact.