Storytelling Squares

“In March 2020, the global pandemic of COVID 19 forced the UK into lockdown. Businesses closed, families were separated and schools shut. The impact was felt across every household in every part of the country, and this project tells the story of one small corner: the community around Evercreech, Somerset.”

Storytelling Squares: A lockdown memory project, in collaboration with the Old Stores Studio CIC, was a local history project, documenting and sharing the local communities experience of lockdown through participatory arts.

An invitation was sent from the Old Stores Studio to the whole community, inviting them to tell their own story of lockdown through an 8” textile square. Over 115 squares were received, and were turned in to a patchwork quilt, on display during Somerset Art Weeks 2022.

I was brought on board to bring the project to life, elevating a patchwork quilt in to an immersive experience and creating a permanent, poignant record of this unique moment in recent history.

Highlights included:

• Identifying and interviewing 7 creators about their lockdown experience, and editing their interviews

• Collaborating with a sound designer to create a sound-scape of interviews, listened to alongside viewing the finished art piece during Somerset Arts Week

• Curating, designing, editing, typesetting and producing a 110 page book of the project

• Creating social media assets to promote the project