The UKRI project is currently in a reflective phase, focused on impact, evaluation, analysis and writing up of findings. In 2020-24, during the first phase of the project, we ran regular workshops and events. Some of these are outlined below.

• Workshops.
  • In 2024 we ran a ‘showcase’ at the University of Bristol that allowed people to explore our objects and activities, in collaboration with the Centre for Health, Humanities and Science.
  • In 2022-23 our workshop programme focused on developing a ‘practical guide’ or ‘toolkit’ for sensory design in hospitals. Full details of the working group can be found HERE.
  • In 2023 we also ran prototyping and ideation workshops, with GOSH Young Person’s Advisory Group and Maternity Voices Partnership. This led to two design briefs, available HERE and HERE, which resulted in artworks and object prototypes.
  • Reports on all creative workshops can be found HERE, including:
    • Workshops.September 2021. As part of Weston Arts & Health week we provided our project’s ‘mapping’ and ‘feeling the hospital’ (clay) activities for NHS staff to complete remotely.
    • Workshop. 1 April 2021. ‘Listening to the Hospital: Free Online Workshop for NHS staff’.
    • Workshop. 12 November 2020. ‘Making Sense of Hospital Spaces: Free Online Poetry Workshop for NHS staff’.
    • Workshop. 17 July 2020. ‘Creative Methods in Health Research: A Virtual Workshop’ (more details of the scope of this workshop can be found in our original CALL FOR CONTRIBUTIONS). Led by the UKRI FLF, in collaboration with the Wellcome Trust network.
• Exhibition 2023-24. The research fed into an exhibition at Southmead and Great Ormond Street Hospitals. Full details can be found HERE.
• We held a public event for the 75th anniversary of the NHS at the Wellcome Trust on 28th June 2023.
• Victoria Bates undertook a one-month fellowship at HEX Centre of Excellence in the History of Experiences in Tampere, Finland, in June 2023, and visited a number of universities in Australia to explore potential collaborations in November-December 2023 including 2 weeks at QUT Design Lab.
• We were awarded ‘Plus Funds’ to run a training and development programme over the course of 2022-23. Full dates and details can be found HERE
• Conferences.
  • The team has presented at many conferences – you can find a full list of our activities on our staff pages at the University of Bristol. Examples from 2020-21 include:
    • As a team:
      • with Vivienne Reiss. European Healthcare Design Conference, 14-17 June 2021. Paper: ‘Interdisciplinary approaches to hospital art and the senses: A Case Study from Great Ormond Street Hospital’.
    • Rebecka Fleetwood-Smith presented at:
      • Culture, Health and Wellbeing International Conference, 21-23 June 2021. Paper: ‘Developing a sensory research toolkit: A remote method’.
      • Curative Things: Medicine/Fashion/Art, 12 February 2021. Paper: ‘Clothing, Expression, and Dementia’.
      • Empowered Conversations, 5 May 2021. Paper: ‘Considering the importance of clothing to people with dementia’.
    • Victoria Bates presented at:
      • Medical Objects in Health Humanities, 10 June 2021. Paper: ‘Sounding Things Out: Hearing the history of hospital objects’.
      • Uncommon Senses 3, 6-9 May 2021. Paper: ‘Sensing Spaces of Healthcare: Creative research methods and sensory memory’.
      • Northern Network for Medical Humanities International Conference, 21 April 2021. Paper Title. ‘Feeling Blue: Colour and the Modern Hospital’.
      • Building Welfare States: New Approaches to Architecture, Community & Planning in Twentieth-Century Britain, 23-25 September 2020. Paper: ‘Soundscapes and the State: Building Welfare in the NHS through Acoustics’.
      • Northern Network for Medical Humanities Research, 21-24 April 2021. Paper: ‘Feeling Blue: Colour and the Modern Hospital’.
  • We were also planning to present at the following events in 2020, which were rescheduled due to Covid-19 disruption:
    • ‘New Narratives’, Arts University Bournemouth.
    • ‘Making Space’, Association for Medical Humanities, University of Limerick.
    • ‘Space, Place and Design in the Medical and Health Humanities’, University of Southern Denmark.
    • ‘Design4Health’, Amsterdam.

Wellcome Trust Network:

• The network posted a number of blogs in 2019-22.
• 4-7 April 2022. Conference on the senses and modern environments of healthcare & care. The Call for Papers available for reference HERE. A write-up of the conference is available HERE.
• Autumn 2021 – Easter 2022. ‘Retreats’ for core collaborators to work towards an interdisciplinary collaborative output. We are developing a creative output with ‘prompts and provocations’ on hospital senses, to be launched in 2022.
• January 2020. Core collaborator interdisciplinary retreat (Yorkshire).
• August 2019. Senses and Health/care Environments Network Launch Event: Thinking through objects