It’s been a mad week setting up the first shop on Hagley Road, in Ladywood, Birmingham. It’s the first stage of our empty shops programme of activity – Inhabit. We are creating a social space by setting up popup arts tearooms across Birmingham. Karen has done a fantastic job drawing together an eclectic mix of tables, chairs, teacups, saucers, teapots and plates. It sets the scene really well.
Our crafts/ interior design artist Melanie Tomlinson has found some really lovely tables, except for that I keep being told off for cleaning them. The aim is that the tea stains are decorated and form part of the final arts product. I keep wiping the tables clean, Mel keeps working with visitors to cover the stains with gold and silver guild – I guess theirs look better! We’ll also be working with teaspoons, creating a visual exhibition of lots of engraved teaspoons. It will look great when it’s all completed and we have hundreds of them hanging up. Puts a whole new meaning to playing spoons - what a racket!
Our photographer, Anand Chabra, has been out and about photographing local residents, as well as people visiting Chennai Dosa, one of our retail restaurant neighbours. It’s going to be hard not going there every lunchtime! Documenting local residents has started and we’re building up a wall - and windows - of visitors. There are already some great shots, but far to many of me either cutting cake or pouring tea, I keep telling Anand to avoid shots of me, grrrrrrr.
They’ll be a mix of creative workshops happening in the space, but always with tea, cake, biscuits and fruit salad in the mix. We’re open to ideas for how the space can be used, we’d love people to pop in, say hi and offer suggestions of what else we could do to help change the face of local high streets.
Today, we’ve had lots of people walking past and checking out the windows, I love it when people walk past and suddenly screech to a halt as they see the photo’s – art in unexpected places! People stop even when it’s pouring it down (which lets face it is most of the time), so it must be good!
We’ve had a real mix of people visiting so far. Everyone loves the idea of a local arts tearoom. I think I’m going to find it really hard to move on, eight weeks just doesn’t seem long enough, and I know that just as we’re bedding in properly we’ll have to leave – boo.
With a mix of small and large tables we are facilitating individuals, small and large groups as well as encouraging people to share cups of tea – and stories – at a larger table. Last week it worked really well, a group of people, who’d never met, talking about photography with Anand on the centre table and in the corner a family talking about changing local high streets and the problem with supermarkets!
Today we were handing out some amazing tiramisu in exchange for a photograph. Lots of interest in that one! We had Anand photographing local people, with local resident Stan Newton taking shots of Anand. Stan’s looking to move into the field of photography so if anyone needs a photographer, or can offer support or opportunities in anyway, let us know. What’s been great is local people wanting to get involved, we’ve had people volunteer, ask how they can support us, as well as people like Stan who are just getting involved. Love it.
We haven’t quite worked out our opening times. The problem is that if it was up to me I’d spend all of my time here in the tearoom. It’s also much busier when it’s not raining, so if we could work out when it’s not going to rain for the next few weeks, that would be great. Yeah, I know, as much chance of that happening as finding the Holy Grail.
We’re talking to a few artists about what they might offer local residents and when workshops will happen - there may even be performances. We’d love Birmingham arts organisations to use the space. We’ll have the programme in the window at 173 Hagley Road, Birmingham but we’ll also make sure we load it up on the website to keep you posted.
Our core opening times will be Tuesdays from 11am till 2pm and Fridays from 2pm till 6pm. Come and see us!
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