Partnering with Artswork to celebrate Her Majesty The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee
Exciting news! We have partnered with Artswork, another Southampton charity, and together we have been awarded funding from the Arts Council’s Let’s Create Jubilee Fund – administered by Hampshire and Isle of Wight Community Foundation (HIWCF) – to help ensure that creativity and good food plays an important role in local community celebrations for Her Majesty The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee!
The Let’s Create Jubilee Fund will ensure that thousands of people from communities all across England will have the opportunity to take part in exciting creative events – all in celebration of the Platinum Jubilee. From puppetry and story creation, through to making crowns, carnival and art trails, there will be a huge range of exciting activities for people of all ages and backgrounds to get involved in.
We have teamed up with the youth arts organisation, Artswork, to offer Southampton schools a series of exciting and engaging events to mark the Jubilee. We will be celebrating with two special Jubilee-themed school lunches – a street party themed picnic and a more formal, sit-down hot meal – together with recipes for everyone to try at home (watch this space!) as part of our Cooking at Home programme. In conjunction, Artswork will be creating a unique puppetry workshop for young people to explore how different communities around the world use food and creativity to mark special occasions, reflecting the role that they have played in many celebrations and travels throughout the Queen’s reign. The workshop will be co-created with pupils from Mount Pleasant Junior School, and then hosted online for all schools to access. You can read more from Artswork, here.
Made possible thanks to National Lottery players and administered by UK Community Foundations on behalf of the Arts Council, the Let’s Create Jubilee Fund will support a huge range of projects throughout England. 44 community foundations have been awarding grants across the country.
We are thrilled to partner with Artswork and find ways to engage children in both food, nutrition and the arts and creativity thanks to this Fund. As a local school meals charity, we know how powerful food can be to engage young people in other themes and to mark special occasions. We are delighted to work with local partners to deliver this unique opportunity for Southampton’s young people. The Jubilee gives us all an opportunity to come together and celebrate – we are excited to play a small part in it.
At City Catering, we are keen to find more ways to engage young people in a range of activities, and see the school lunch as a brilliant springboard for this. Louise Govier over at Artswork said: “At Artswork, we believe in the power of arts and creativity to shape happier and healthier children and young people. We’re delighted to be partnering with City Catering for this project, combining an exciting puppetry workshop, co-created with children and young people, with their nutritious meals. Food is a way to break down some of the barriers faced when engaging with creativity and the arts – everyone eats, everyone celebrates with food, and everyone can find creativity in coming together!”
Darren Henley, Chief Executive at Arts Council England said “The Let’s Create Jubilee Fund is a wonderful example of our ambition to give everyone the opportunity to participate in and experience the arts, culture and creativity – made possible thanks to National Lottery players. This June, we’ll see communities across England coming together to celebrate a historic milestone for this country. I’m excited to see these projects brought to life in villages, towns and cities across the country as our wonderfully creative communities celebrate The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee.”
Jacqui Scott, CEO at HIWCF said, “We would like to thank the National Lottery and Arts Council England for this exciting opportunity to support our local charitable sector during the historic Platinum Jubilee celebrations. This is a fabulous opportunity for us to celebrate our shared cultural history, and we are looking forward to seeing an extraordinary range of activities that reflect the diverse nature of our communities.”
Keep an eye on our socials and blog, to discover more and find out how you can get involved! In the meantime, head over to see how we partnered with the City of Culture Bid team to deliver another exciting Theme Day Lunch on our recent blog, here.