We have been working to create inclusive practices for planning and the redevelopments of Digbeth and the city.
‘Women In the Centre’, Walk and Exhibition, Grand Union, Birmingham. Image by Debbie Humphry, 2023.
Women’s (other) needs are often ignored in the city and their struggles for the spaces and places they need are bypassed or forgotten. In August 2023 we collaborated with Spaces of Hope/People’s Plans research project to discover the hidden histories of women-led activisms in the city.
We screened the film ‘From Paradise Circus’ (1988. Dir. Heather Powell.) that was produced by Birmingham Film & Video Workshop Production. We also installed a temporary exhibition and hosted a walk and discussion. The walk emerged from women sharing their histories and more recent activisms of community-led planning and place-making in Birmingham from the 1970s onwards. On this walk, we invited participants to hear and share stories about fighting for a women- and child-friendly city, safe and accessible to all.
Still from Heather Powell’s film ‘Paradise Circus’ (1988).