St Raphael’s Pt.1
Project
St Rapael’s Estate
Client
Karakusevic Carson Architects
Location
Brent, North West London
We wanted to amplify the youth voice during the community consultation process, connecting young residents to placemaking and their community, whilst providing employment, skills development and training. We interviewed and employed four young residents from the estate who become our youth event planners, over a 6 month period the young residents designed their event, planned how they wanted to capture the opinions and views of young residents, and set about making it happen.
Working with award-winning housing and urban design practice, Karakusevic Carson Architects, we were commissioned to design a youth engagement strategy for young residents living on St Raphael’s Estate in Brent, North London. The architecture practice were appointed to work up options for the future of the estate, working with the local community.
ST RAPAEL’S L.O.U.D
We used our creative engagement approach to celebrate local youth culture, whilst gaining valuable insights from young residents living on the estate, understanding what the youth community wanted to see from any potential redevelopment plans. The team worked with their peers to create a series of questions that they wanted to present to Brent Council, providing direct insight into the hopes and fears they had for their estate and any potential redevelopment or infill.
We commissioned a special photography exhibition by Brent Photographer Daniel Alfonzo Thomas, which showcased 12 portrait images of young residents living on St Raphs estate, along with their statements of aspiration, statements which detailed their personal aspirations and the future aspirations for their community.
We invited residents and young people living on the estate to an evening of live music and visual art, with performances from local artists and headline act, award winning spoken word artist George the Poet, who grew up on St Raphael’s estate.
During the event, the youth collective interviewed their peers gaining further insight into what young residents liked and/or disliked about their estate and community, they also opened their photography exhibition and presented Brent Council with their questions. The whole event was compered by the young residents.
We always aim to create a legacy longer than the project itself, each of the event planners were trained in how to register as self employed freelancers, how to complete invoices and how to file tax returns.
We wanted to support the young people in developing networks to help develop job opportunities and awareness of other cultural and creative career avenues, as part of this we visited a number of creative organisations, including On-Road in East London.
Brent was the London borough of culture in 2020 (Brent 2020), so we invited other creative agencies who were cultural partners for Brent 2020 to speak to the young residents we were working with about their projects and how they could get involved, which a number of them sign-ups for.
We can read our project evaluation report here
