Making Places will benefit every ward in Waltham Forest
This ambitious art and culture programme aims to deliver creative projects that residents can enjoy and that will help make our borough a better place to be. Projects will have a lasting impact on local communities, creating places which are brighter, safer and where residents and visitors enjoy spending time.
Projects could be anything from play equipment for local children to enjoy, outdoor furniture or murals that enhance an area, a community garden or a lighting installation that helps to make a neighbourhood feel safer. Each proposal is developed in response to a site-specific brief, informed by resident suggestions.
Creative Projects
Creative practitioners including architects, designers, landscape gardeners and artists submit their ideas through a formal tender process known as an ‘open call’. The first Open Call ran from 23 August to 8 October 2017 and projects were commissioned in phases from autumn 2017. A second Open Call ran in October 2019 and projects were commissioned in 2020.
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Creative practitioners are invited to put forward site-specific proposals via an open call process. Applicants must be living or working in the UK.
An open call is an invitation to creative practitioners to put forward ideas and propose how they would deliver a project at a specific site or across multiple sites. The first Making Places open call launched on 23 August 2017. The second open call launched on 7 October 2019.
We welcome creative practitioners who are also residents of Waltham Forest to put forward proposals for Making Places, and they can do so by going through the open call process. Some residents have also suggested project ideas for sites that they nominated, and this information will be shared with creative practitioners as part of the site brief. Creative practitioners might build upon residents’ suggestions when they put forward a proposal, but they may come up with new ideas that haven't been thought of before.
After careful consideration of resident nominations, councillors made decisions about which site would be the location for a Making Places project in their ward. Further information about the selected sites can be seen on the Chosen Sites page.
Proposals are long-listed by officers in partnership with Create. They are then shortlisted by a creative advisory panel. For the second Open Call, residents will be given the opportunity to comment on shortlisted proposals before local councillors choose the project they think will work the best in their ward.
A wide range of exciting and imaginative projects will be commissioned, all over the borough. The first round of commissions included light artworks, outdoor community spaces, growing projects and landscape schemes, a pavilion, a sculptural installation and an amphitheatre. The open call process means we don’t know in advance the kinds of proposals that we will receive. Artists, landscape designers, architects and other creative practitioners are all invited to put forward their ideas.
Our ambition is to create a project in every ward that residents can enjoy, and that will have a lasting impact on the neighbourhood.
Making Places is a £1m project and the budget per ward is up to £40,000. Making Places is funded by Waltham Forest Council, who are leading the way in improving residents’ quality of life through arts and culture.