Art, Nature and Everyday Actions

One of the questions we’re exploring through MAKE Room is how creative practice can shift our perspective on nature – not just as something to protect, but something we’re deeply part of.

This isn’t about delivering a message. It’s about being in a space, noticing what’s around you, and responding creatively - whether that’s through drawing, walking, making, mapping or simply spending time together. Many of our workshops use reclaimed or locally sourced materials, encouraging low-impact making and resourcefulness.

We’re also interested in how creative approaches can help tackle complex issues like energy use, waste, and climate change – not by simplifying them, but by helping people feel more connected, more confident, and more part of a collective response.

Through its roaming structure, MAKE Room offers a new kind of cultural infrastructure - lightweight, collaborative, and rooted in local context. It’s not a touring artwork, but a touring idea: that nature is not separate from us, and that creative action can help us reimagine how we live, work and care for our surroundings.

Over the past few months, MAKE Room has been quietly building momentum. While the early stages of the project focused on listening, research and relationship-building, we’re now beginning to see the creative outcomes take shape.

In both Glossop and Heanor, Glassball Studio have led artist residencies that explore local material cultures, landscape histories and the sensory experience of being in place. From conversations with community groups to collaborative making sessions using found or sustainable materials, the activities are starting to reveal how creative practice can support connection - not only to nature, but to each other.

These residencies are also shaping the MAKE Room framework itself: a methodology for engaging with climate, wellbeing and place through participatory, site-responsive activity. While that might sound academic, the real-life results are very tangible, building shelters in woodlands, sharing stories around local plants, sketching site maps, and experimenting with low-energy making techniques. It's about small, meaningful actions that connect people with their environment in new and often surprising ways.

We’ve also launched a dedicated MAKE Room Instagram account to document and share the journey as it unfolds - offering glimpses behind the scenes and celebrating the communities and collaborators involved.

We’re now preparing to launch a summer programme of MAKE Room events in Glossop and Heanor, which will include a mix of creative workshops, guided walks, artist-led activities and community gatherings. These events are designed to be welcoming, low-pressure and inclusive - offering a chance to explore the natural world and your own creativity, no matter your background or experience.

In early autumn, we’ll expand the programme with a countywide series of walks, talks and online conversations, inviting more people to engage with the themes of nature-connectedness, climate action and creative making. Each activity will build on the unique character of the local area, while contributing to a wider conversation about how art and culture can help us shape more sustainable, resilient futures.

MAKE Room is not about quick fixes or polished outcomes. It’s about creating space - for reflection, for collaboration, and for reimagining how we relate to the places and ecosystems we’re part of. It’s about slowing down, noticing more, and making room for nature in our lives, our thinking, and our futures.

Are you are an individual, group, organisation or school that wants to get involved? Then please fill out this form and we'll get back to you within 7-10 days.