"My new home!" - pop up landscapes and happy news

With little to do and no space to enjoy childhood young sanctuary seekers living in temporary accomodation do not get to enjoy the same freedoms as their peers. Our work aims to change that. We've been proud to have spent time creating inspiring opportunities for young people living in Greater Manchester's hotels.

For this session, Afrocats artist Loren developed an art and craft activity for the young sanctuary seekers with the aim of creating a pop-up landscape with coloured card and felt tips.

This was the final session for this group of young people as they were due to move into more permanent accomodation. The clear thing on everyone’s mind was moving.

One girl excitedly told us, “ I go to my new house tomorrow” and another said, “we just went to see a house and it was AMAZING!”

With this as inspiration, many children created their pop-up landscape to look like their new home and included their dream pets on the front lawn. It was good to see all the children coming together in their last week.

Whilst there was excitement this session was also tinged with sadness as the children will be split up, moving across the country with some going as far as Blackpool and unlikely to see each other soon.

This did come with its challenges as emotions were high but our skilled team of artists and producers were quick to change the tempo of the session to help expel some of that emotional energy. Clearing the room we all got stuck into playing musical statues, giving the children the opportunity to move and dance with their feelings rather than sitting still and dwelling on them.

Although at times hectic it was important for us to adapt the session so the young people had space to be together and enjoy their final moments as friends.

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