What would you create in a city’s Forgotten Spaces?

Lynwood Gardens by Richard Hanson

Calling all you creative thinkers, this is to let you know about quite a special or should I say monumental competition. Called Forgotten Spaces, it’s your chance to submit design ideas for transforming an abandoned piece of land in Sheffield and in fact anywhere in the ‘S’ post code area, that’s Barnsley, Chesterfield, Dronfield, Hope Valley, Mexborough, Rotherham and Worksop.

A Forgotten Space could be a grassy verge, wasteland, unused car park, derelict building, underpass or flyover. The aim is to present regeneration ideas for areas that don’t yet have a place in the hearts and minds of local communities, and explore the possibilities for breathing life into them. You can create something simple or complex, commercial or public, your own piece of public art or a new building. The requirements are simple: the design must respond to the area and serve a function for the local community.

Arundel Gate by Richard Hanson

The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) Yorkshire and Sheffield Hallam University have launched the competition, but you don’t need to be an architect and you don’t have to come from Sheffield to enter. It’s an open invitation to artists, designers, planners, students, engineers and architects across the UK. There’s also the opportunity to be paired with a professional architect as a mentor, to make sure you achieve the required technical and professional presentation.

If you’d like ideas for a Forgotten Space, each of the Community Assemblies in the Sheffield City Region has identified a potential site in their area. You can use one of these suggestions or choose one of your own.

It’s an innovative, grass roots approach, allowing local artists and designers to come up with solutions for neglected sites. Although proposals won’t necessarily be constructed, the competition is intended to provoke discussion amongst landowners, local authorities and investors about regeneration and the role of the local community.

Corker Bottoms by Richard Hanson
Corker Bottoms by Richard Hanson

Short listed proposals will be showcased at the Crucible Theatre in September 2011. Winners will be awarded cash prizes of first prize £5,000, second prize £2,000 and third prize £1,000. You’ll need to be fairly quick off the mark to register for the competition, as the deadline is Wednesday 30 March 2011. The final closing date for entries is Thursday 12 May 2011.

This is your chance to dream, design and think differently about some of South Yorkshire’s Forgotten Spaces.

Contact information
Claire Hutchinson, RIBA Yorkshire
Phone: 0113 389 9870
Email: claire.hutchinson@inst.riba.org

Tess Humphrys, Sheffield Hallam University
Phone: 0114 225 4025
Email: t.humphrys@shu.ac.uk

6 comments

  1. Such a shame they won’t be building any of them. Some small designs could be built for next to nothing. If there was a construction budget of say £25k it would focus the designs for something of a sensible scale with creative use of materials etc and then it could realistically be built.

  2. Thanks for your comment James, having spoken to the organisers of the competition, there maybe the potential for realising a specific idea, but there are no guarantees. The competition was launched by RIBA in London last year, with unprecedented success, subsequently two of the submissions are being explored for construction, one by the Olympic Committee.

    Sheffield has been selected as the first destination for the competition outside of London, it would be a real coup for the city and indeed the north, if a design proposal were to capture the imagination of planners and property developers sufficiently to be realised.

  3. None of these spaces are really forgotten. They just haven’t been commodified yet. How about leaving them the fuck alone.

  4. I know some great forgotten spaces in Leeds. Not the right post code, but a fantastic opportunities nonetheless. Any chance the competition will circulate through the yorkshire area? As the 4×4 meeting last thursday (Leeds Met) showed, there’s a lot to think about and competitions could make a great addition to the improvement of the quality of the built environment. However, that would mostly be demonstrated only if some of the ideas will be realised. As long as it is really about (re)using, claiming or (re)designing ‘forgotten’ places (I do understand the sentiment of Kenny Jenkins, but there are many simply derelict and completely unusable spaces in many cities, which have a contra-productive effect on whole areas) there is a lot to be gained in terms of the experience and aesthetics of places.

    1. Forgotten Spaces is a great project that can be applied to any city. There’s no reason why we can’t run a Leeds version in the future, if we can find the right partners to work with and fund the project. Sheffield Hallam have instrumental partners in bringing Forgotten Spaces to Sheffield, so we would have to find someone equally as keen in Leeds. Any suggestions – let us know!

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