News: Students help design the new skate park opposite the City Hub

We’re partnering with Skate Nottingham to give learners a say in designing a skate spot on Sussex Street, at the bottom of the Nottingham Contemporary steps — right on the doorstep of the Nottingham College Hub building!

Over the next couple of weeks, our students will be involved in teams meetings to discuss the project, and have the opportunity to submit their own designs for skateable structures to be included.

SESSION ONE: Thursday 21^st January, 10:00 – 11:00am (Link for students available on StudentNet)

Chris Lawton (Co-Founder of Skate Nottingham, skater and Senior Lecturer of Economics and Employability at NTU) will introduce the project and share images of the Sussex Street development, showing where the sculptural forms could live when the site is near completion (late summer 2021).

Guest speaker Rich Holland will talk about his career and practice. Rich is a British-born artist and designer who has worked with Nike SB, Carhartt and Converse and he is currently redesigning the Nike European HQ in the Netherlands to be surrounded by skateable sculptures. As someone with a Fine Arts education background and a skater himself, his skills and passion have enabled him to work on various projects from DIY art exhibitions in London, on to sculptural installations in places like the London Southbank Centre and all over the world, and then to a more formal commercial design career, building and designing for events alongside gallery exhibitions all over Europe. These have notably included the Aalto exhibition at the Kiasma Gallery of Modern Art in Helsinki and the Van Gogh Museum (LINK: http://​flo​da31​.com/​r​i​c​h​h​o​l​l​a​n​d​/​e​x​h​i​b​i​t​ions/)

Learners will then be set a task for the week: To draw (by hand or electronically), model, make or write about their idea for a sculptural form and other designs that could go into Sussex Street, inspired by Rich’s practice.

SESSION TWO: Thursday 28^th January, 10:00 – 11:00am (Link for students available on StudentNet)

In this session students will be invited to share their screens and showcase their ideas developed since last week’s session! 

Guest speaker Bedir Bekar will then talk to learners about the materials that could be used to build their designs, their qualities and other engineering and architectural considerations from safety to the aesthetic and functional potential of the lighting in the space. 

Bedir is a skater and Chartered Engineer who teaches at UCL and has done lots of creative work with different materials, including designing forms for Street League and Innoskate at the London Olympic Park in 2019. He will also talk about his practice and some of the recent projects he’s been involved in. 

The work produced by learners at the end of Session 2 goes into the material exhibited at the Festival of Science and Curiosity over the 8^th-17^th Feb (online). Skate Nottingham will also publish a selection of the images in a printed Zine which will include photographs, participants’ designs and a ​‘conversation with’ Rich, Bedir and other international experts.