Glossop is home to some amazing creative talent in a broad spectrum of disciplines from food and drink, through musicians and artists to those who make their living delivering creative services like marketing, design, photography, videography, copywriting and the like.
The need for Collaboration
One factor that is common across these sectors is the need to work collaboratively, and to engage with other like-minded people.
Most of the creatives in the town are working on their own or in small groups focused on a specific goal but, to be most effective, we need to come together. To share ideas, to create partnerships to tackle bigger project, or simply to share contacts and expertise.
In the fullness of time our vision is that Glossop will have spaces that facilitate this co-working and collaboration, including the development of an Arts Centre in Victoria Hall and the creation of co-working and creative space within the Market/Town Hall complex. However that’s the future, and spaces like that will succeed if there is a strong and thriving creative population within the town.
For this reason we are already working to create this collaboration through the creation of networking groups.
- Glossop Creates Food and Drink
- Glossop Creates Artists
- Glossop Creates Music and Entertainment
- Glossop Creates Commercial Creatives
Whilst networking and collaborating has been challenging over the last 12 months, we have still managed to move things forward using virtual meeting places like Google Meets and Zoom. As a result, three of these groups (Food & Drink, Musicians & Commercial Creatives) are already off the ground, with plans to launch the Artists group imminently.
As restrictions start to relax, as hopefully they will over the next few months, we can start to meet physically to build on the relationships that have started to form online.
Purpose
Through Glossop Creates, the Glossop Creative Trust aims to bring people together to raise aspirations, enable them to think bigger and be more ambitious. This philosophy was demonstrated perfectly recently when we had the opportunity to submit a seven figure bid to the UK Community Renewal Fund.
By harnessing the passion of the local creative community and joining this up with the skills of placemaking professional Claire Tymon, we were able to create a strong bid to the fund, aimed at the development of Cultural and Artistic activities in the town and beyond, as a catalyst for the town’s economic recovery as we emerge from COVID. All of this was made possible because of our fantastic links with High Peak Borough Council who facilitated & endorsed the whole process.
The bid encompasses a diverse range of ideas including:
- Developing innovative and original public art installations
- Developing existing and launching new cultural festivals
- Exploring and piloting new ways to use heritage assets in a sustainable manner to create facilities for local creatives
- Supporting and encouraging local arts organisations to grow and develop
Without the collaboration that was started through the Glossop Creates networks, a bid like this would not have been possible. Furthermore, the fact that we had already started to build these relationships meant that we could pull it all together within a very tight deadline of just a couple of weeks. A process that true demonstrated the power of collaboration. A Collaboration that will benefit the entire creative community in the town and beyond.
How to get involved
Whether or not the bid is successful, and we will be talking more about it over the coming weeks, the process of working on it has brought us together and made us more ambitious as to what can be achieved. As such it has demonstrated perfectly the vision and objectives of the Glossop Creative Trust.
If you would like to get involved and join one of our networks, we would love to hear from you. Simply click here, and sign up as a member or supporter of the Trust, or simply email hello@glossopcreates.com. It would also be great if you could tell us a little bit about yourself, and what you do. We would be delighted to hear from you and to welcome you into the network.