Beauty for Ashes
Beauty from Ashes was an eight-week trauma-informed creative programme for women experiencing multiple disadvantage commissioned by Redcar and Cleveland Borough Council and South Tees Public Health. Designed and delivered by Claire, the project used nature connection, charcoal making, observational drawing and reflective practice. The project created a safe environment where participants could explore creativity, develop confidence and improve emotional wellbeing.
Key outcomes included:
23% reduction in anxiety across the group (GAD-7)
19% reduction in symptoms of depression (PHQ-9)
61% increase in confidence and creative self-belief
Every participant reported learning new creative skills
Most participants described feeling more positive, proud of themselves and more confident by the end of the programme.
After Franki Raffles
In partnership with Borderlands and ARCH, this project worked creatively with women recovering from the trauma of sexual violence and domestic abuse. Using the work of photographer Franki Raffles as a starting point, alongside other artists and photographers whose practice explored themes of domestic abuse, participants were encouraged to reflect on and communicate their own experiences of trauma, resilience and recovery.
Through a series of supported workshops, combining psychological tools and creative activities, the women explored personal storytelling using photography, poetry and drawing, developing creative responses that gave voice to experiences that are often silenced or hidden. The project created a safe and collaborative environment where participants could experiment with different forms of expression, build confidence, and connect with others through shared creativity. The resulting work highlighted both the realities of abuse and the strength, agency and recovery of the women involved.
Creative End of Life Consultation
Creative End of Life was a collaborative project delivered in partnership with Borderlands Public Health South Tees and the Middlesbrough Methodist Hub. The project used creativity as a way to open up conversations around death, dying, grief, and living with life-limited illness, helping participants approach difficult subjects in a supportive and accessible environment. Alongside creative workshops, the project connected participants with practical advice and insights from grief practitioners. Three creative sessions were delivered with community groups across Middlesbrough, culminating in an ‘Unconference’, a shared gathering and celebration at Middlesbrough Town Hall.
Sessions were held with the senior ladies group at AAPNA, Middlesbrough, an Asian community centre, supporting vulnerable people from South Asian origin and the senior men’s and ladies groups at the Community Care Partnership, Middlesbrough, a South Asian community centre.
Creative Consultation Residency
Collaborating with dancer Jenny Chrisp, Claire delivered 2 rounds of creative consultation workshops around the ‘Ageing Well’ mission of the South Tees Public Health Joint Strategic Needs Assessment. Working with AAPNA, Middlesbrough, a South Asian community centre that provides support for elderly women from S.Asian backgrounds and St. Hilda’s community outreach hub in Redcar, which also provides support for older people around grief, loneliness and isolation, the workshops ran for 8 weeks with each group and included creative activities and discussion around the barriers faced by women in later life, around accessing healthcare.
Artforms used included: movement/dance/hand-choreography, gelli-printing, painting, casting hands in plaster, large-scale, collaborative drawing with movement and music.
Kite Club
Kite Club was a six-week participatory art project created by artists Claire Harrison and Beth Johnson, supported by Borderlands and developed with refugees and asylum seekers connected to Open Door in Middlesbrough. Using kite-making as a metaphor for freedom, journeying, and transcending cultural barriers, the project created a safe and welcoming space for participants to share stories, build confidence, and connect through creativity.
Across six weekly workshops, participants explored the history of kites, experimented with recycled materials, mapped personal journeys, and designed both individual and collective artworks. Shared meals formed an important part of each session, helping to build trust, friendship, and a sense of community between people from ten different countries.
Delivered across venues including The Old Firehouse, Middlesbrough Town Hall, Melbourne House, and Open Door Northeast, Kite Club promoted wellbeing, social inclusion, and creative expression. The project culminated in the creation and flying of handmade kites that reflected participants’ experiences of displacement, resilience, hope, and finding safety in Teesside.
In These Shoes
In These Shoes was a celebratory, arts-based project that brought women and communities together to explore personal narratives through the universal stimulus of shoes and feet. A collaboration between Wild Vision Collective and Night Light Theatre CIC, the project provided a unique, trauma-informed creative experience for vulnerable women.
The Creative Journey: Participants engaged in 12 interdisciplinary workshops to explore their identities and life journeys through several mediums:
Visual Arts: Casting feet or hands in plaster of Paris to create intimate sculptures.
Print-making & Writing: Creating collective "foot-print" canvases and using poetry to capture lived experiences.
Theatre & Film: Developing fictional characters to share personal stories from a safe distance, as well as producing a video that captured the women's lived experiences.
Impact and Exhibition: The project served as a powerful vehicle for advocacy and self-expression, incorporating mindfulness to support mental health and healing. The work culminated in a high-profile public exhibition held in an empty shop unit in Stockton. Over the course of three weeks, more than 350 members of the public visited the display, ensuring the women's voices and stories were celebrated by the wider community.
Unlocked in Lockdown
Unlocked in Lockdown was a community-focused pop-up exhibition staged in an empty shop unit in Stockton-on-Tees from October 2020 to January 2021. Created during the COVID-19 pandemic, the exhibition transformed a vacant retail space into a temporary gallery showcasing artwork made during lockdown by hobbyists, students, and professional artists.
The aim was to counter feelings of isolation and disconnection by creating an accessible public arts space at a time when galleries, studios, and cultural venues were largely closed.
The exhibition highlighted the creativity that emerged during lockdown, featuring a broad range of media and personal responses to the pandemic experience. By occupying an empty high street shop, Unlocked in Lockdown also reflected wider conversations about community resilience and the changing role of town centres during COVID-19. The exhibition encouraged local engagement with art in a safe and informal setting, helping to foster a sense of hope, visibility, and shared experience during a period of uncertainty.
