This is the third in a special series of blog posts, in which I talk to University of Staffordshire colleagues about their impactful public engagement activities. Introducing Professor Carola Boehm, one of the founding members and current Chair of ‘Stoke Creates’.
- What is ‘Stoke Creates’, how did it come about, and what is your role in it?
Stoke Creates is a cultural compact, designed to connect people, communities and organisations with creative and cultural opportunities. The aim is to create a vibrant cultural hub in Stoke-on-Trent. Prior to Stoke Creates, several large-scale strategic culturally oriented projects focused on creativity, creative industries and cultural developments, and these established the foundations for Stoke Creates. Projects included Appetite (2013 onwards, funded by Arts Council England); Art-City (2014-2019, funded by the Esmee Fairburn Foundation), the ERDF-funded FACTORY project (2015-2023), and the Create Place Co-Creation and Placemaking Leadership Programme (ACE-funded). Staffordshire University was a key partner in these projects. The early projects fed into Stoke-on-Trent’s first dedicated Cultural Strategy ‘Making the Creative City’, published in 2016.
Building on many years of research into arts and higher education partnerships (I collated my research in a book about this topic published in 2022: Arts and Academia), I became the institutional lead for the FACTORY project on joining Staffordshire University in 2017, supporting creative SMEs in the region. In my early days at Staffordshire, I experienced the excitement and the disappointment of Stoke-on-Trent’s unsuccessful bid to become UK City of Culture 2021. All the partners involved in the bid consortium resolved to build on momentum by continuing to work together, eventually becoming Stoke Creates. Staffordshire University (and I) was one of its founding members, together with Keele University, YMCA, BCB, Barts, Cultural Destinations, Appetite, PiCL/LSEP, New Vic and the city council.
To build cultural leadership capacity, I led the collaborative Create Place Leadership programme (2019-2023). Funded by Arts Council England (ACE), Create Place focused on place-making and co-creation, and aimed to develop creative and cultural leaders in North Staffordshire and Cheshire East. Stoke Creates was officially registered as a Community Interest Company in 2021, marking the formal establishment of the cultural compact. I led a working group called Stoke Creates Exchange Forum to develop a strategy for Stoke Creates Forum, which continues to shape its vision, mission and values. I became Stoke Creates Co-Chair in 2022, and then Chair in 2023. Stoke Creates, for me, is the scaffolding that helps creatives create more, and to work towards our collective goal of making our places as creative as they can be. With it comes all different kinds of economic and social prosperities. So creativity and creative communities are evidenced to be some of the most important dimensions for placemaking policies.
2. What are the main challenges that your network addresses?
Stoke-on-Trent is a city with unique cultural assets but also high levels of deprivation. Stoke Creates aims to address inequalities through harnessing the power of culture. It fosters collaboration, supports creativity, and prioritises inclusivity. We don’t deliver cultural projects as ‘Stoke Creates’, but we support others to deliver.
3. Can you give some examples of how Stoke Creates has made a difference?
Absolutely! I’ll share three examples:
- We influenced policy at Stoke-on-Trent City Council when they asked us to contribute to an update of their Cultural Strategy in 2022. We ran a participatory consultation process that led to significant contributions to the proposed strategy. It showed what a difference it makes when you include diverse voices in tangible ways. We also regularly meet with MPs and others to contribute our collective expertise into culture-led regeneration.
- By October 2023, Stoke Creates secured a total of ca £1.3 million investment into arts and cultural initiatives and projects. In addition, we were one of the partners chosen to lead the first ever Big Give Arts for Impact campaign, raising more than £130,000 in just 7 days in March 2024. Seven charities benefitted from this initiative, whereby individual donations were match funded by Big Give and Stoke Creates, working in partnership with NPAC, MadeInStoke and Arts Council England.
- Stoke Creates contributed to a significant increase in numbers of National Portfolio Organisations (NPOs) funded by ACE. This was achieved through enhancing the connectivity between ACE and interested NPO applicants and supporting organisations to apply for NPO status. This support contributed to an increase from 3 to 8 NPOs in Stoke.
4. What do you think the future holds for Stoke Creates and what does success look like?
There is now an added focus on keeping our momentum going, by attending to the sustainability of our organisation itself, in order to ensure there is an engine for growing the infrastructures and connectivity needed for increased cultural production and every-day creativity. This includes leaning into our role as a place-based sector development organisation, ensuring that all our stakeholders and partners are well placed to actively contribute. We are also applying to become a charity and with this, there are additional exciting prospects to benefit our cultural sectors in the region. We will also continue to connect with policymakers and to share our learning in a way that will hopefully support positive developments in other towns and cities.
Our most recent successes include the successful application to the World Craft Council, a process led by Stoke Creates in partnership with the city council, demonstrating how cultural compacts can lead these kinds of strategic initiatives with partnerships full of passion, craft and expertise. We are now a World Craft City, joining ca 60 cities worldwide with this title, allowing our story to interact with other places in the world with similar ambitions and passions. These glocal connections (local impact with global significance) put our places and our communities on a global map, further benefitting our communities, our attractiveness as a place and our creative professional.
5. How do you feel this contributes to Staffordshire Universities Connected Communities vision and strategy?
As I highlight in my book, ‘Arts and Academia: The Role of the Arts in Civic Universities’, I see the arts as a core element of civic university initiatives. They are the connector that enables us to work together collaboratively for greater impact. Stoke Creates is therefore the arts and cultural part of the Connected Communities vision. It is the strategic, policy-oriented strategic framework that offers anyone with an interest in arts and culture to connect in impactful ways.
Stoke Creates Exchange Forum 2022
