Skywriters 2022: Year in Review
Issue 2: A fantastic 12 months for our award winning organisation!
It’s been an amazing year for Skywriters; delivering creative opportunities to hundreds of children and adults across Liverpool City Region, launching and establishing our creative writing programmes, events and products AND becoming an award winning organisation and Director.
We really have built on the foundations of year 1. Here’s what we achieved in Year 2!
January
We made lots of plans and supported the launch of the Writers Bus on Tour with Writing on the Wall and Arts Groupie at Liverpool Central Library. This was to celebrate Liverpool Literacy Cycle’s Liverpool Year of Writing #LiverpoolWrites Travelling all across Liverpool to bring literature to communities! We joined the Liverpool Literacy Cycle core group to plan events and activities for the rest of the year.
We also began our Action Learning sessions with School of Social Entrepreneurs Northwest!
February
We spent a weekend at the stunning Gladstone Library to work on our School of Social Entrepreneurs Northwest and meet some important writing deadlines.
We had a fantastic day talking Values and Storytelling with our #startup School of Social Entrepreneurs group!
We were also attended Central Library on Saturday 26th February for the FINAL 2021 Liverpool Year of Writing event…and the beginning of 2022 Liverpool Year of Spoken Word! We celebrated the incredible year we’ve had with workshops, showcases, and performances and Lord Mayor Mary Rasmussen officially introduced the Year of Spoken Word 🗣 #LiverpoolSpeaks
March
We worked with Creative Spaces Co to create a screen display at Museum of Liverpool to highlight the work of 10 women who have helped shape Liverpool through their activism. Read all about it here!
Skywriters worked in partnership with National Museums Liverpool and began delivering the free My Story 'Museum in a Box' creative sessions eligible to community groups and organisations across Liverpool! 🙌🏿 Our first session was with Clatterbridge Cancer Centre, exploring our pandemic memories over through art! It was an honour and privilege to listen to people's stories/support them to create their memory boxes!
Liverpool Echo News featured our Director, Nat, as one of their inspirational women in Merseyside! Read the article here! ❤✊🏾🙌🏿💃🏾 #IWD2022 #BreakTheBias
We were participated as a speaker to Liverpool Year of Spoken Word's first #FemaleForum in the beautiful Hornby Room in Liverpool Central Library. The theme was healing and many powerful conversations were had!
April
We began delivering a 6 weeks of sessions at Kirkby Library for the Different Stories Shared Lives Project with Writing on the Wall. The project provided platforms, pathways, and creative opportunities for underrepresented communities across the LCR to express themselves, raise awareness of their histories and explore contemporary experiences of living and working in the region. Participants took part in a series of workshops, receive mentoring from established writers, and created a publishable anthology . These stories will be showcased in a variety of settings across the region, including the borough libraries.
We celebrated National Poetry Month by sharing poetry every day to celebrate!
We had a great day with @SSENorthWest cohort. Thanks to Sally Ann Watkins from Homebaked and Claire Morgan from Ykids Bootle for your fantastic input on Pricing and Measuring Impact! 🌠🖤
Our Director, Nat, was featured in "Voices behind the placard" exhibition in the Skylight Gallery, a new display exploring Liverpool's community activism with new objects & stories, on display in The People's Republic gallery/.
We had a lovely session at Liverpool Irish Centre with My Story Liverpool 📚Participants brought in objects to discuss and add to their memory boxes and we performed poetry from our #Skywriters book!
We announced success in our Bubble Up Creative Commissions 8k bid with Curious Minds North West working in partnership with National Museums Liverpool to deliver creative writing workshops to Black young people, publishing an anthology of their work & contributing to Liverpool Literacy Cycles #YearOfSpokenWord✍🏾
May
Hosted The Writer Before The Page with the fantastic Dominique Walker, Janaya Pickett and The Goddess Projects as part of Writing on the Wall’s Future Imperfect Festival.
We completed our fantastic Writing on the Wall’s #DifferentVoicesSharedLives sessions and felt so privileged that the group trusted us with their stories. Thanks to Sampath, Altiab, Rob, Senait, Jasmine, Mohammed and Florianne.
For #mentalhealthawarenessweek the theme was loneliness. Skywriters attended a women's health event to meet new organisations at Epic Women’s Academy , the Liverpool Year of Spoken Word Meeting, Action Learning session and delivering creative writing sessions 🌠🖤It's community that holds us and supports us. We believe in bringing people together through creativity!
We delivered the My Story Liverpool Session to some amazing Afghan women and recited Skywriters poetry. Thank you to Athena who translated the poem "Memories" into Farsi for the group. ✍🏾📚
June
We had a great time at Black British Book Festival in Birmingham! Seen some lovely talented people, learnt a lot AND was given a load of new books to read! ✍🏾📚
Met some adorable kids at Alder Hey Hospital delivering sessions with National Museums Liverpool ✍🏾We explored dinosaur fossils, composed poetry and began decorating our My Story Liverpool boxes.
Delivered creative writing workshops at Teenage Cancer Trust "Find Your Sense of Tumour" event for young people who have had cancer.
Delivered Scriptwriting sessions to Savera UK youth group to aid them in creating their educational film on Harmful Practices.
July
Skywriters officially had an award winning Director and Founder! Our Director, Nat won MERSEYSIDE WOMAN OF THE YEAR SOCIAL IMPACT AWARD sponsored by Everton Football Club 🌟
Worked with Writing on the Wall at Princes Primary and Kingsley Primary delivering sessions on Nelson Mandela and the importance of activism. The young people wrote down there hopes, created a slogan and designed their placards for Mandela8 Liverpool parade on Mandela day!
The Muse Room is Skywriters free hub for creatives that meets bimonthly to discuss creativity. ✍🏾📚🌠🖤We went on another fantastic trip out and watched the amazing Hollie Mcnish and Michael Pederson at A Lovely Word at Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse 🎭
We featured in Upfront Global newsletter with 10 links that represent the social impact work our Director is involved in!
Hosted The Inclusion Exchange with Bakare Barley Ltd The Inclusion Exchange is a new webinar and podcast series which forms part of Bakare Barley's free resource offering. Joseph Harker shared his personal journey from Editor and Publisher of Black Briton, Assistant Editor of The Voice, to Senior Editor, Diversity and Development at the Guardian.
We had a fabulous session with Paper Work Theatre 🎭 Our Director, Natalie Denny delivered a session on her writing and publishing journey to inspire other writers whatever age and stage they're at!
Started a project on behalf of Read Now Write Now The Future 2050 sessions! We made poetry using our names, discussed what the world 28 years on would look like and wrote our future 2050 postcards! Amazing ideas from the kids! 🤖✍🏾📚 #postcardsfromthefuture
August
We delivered The Social Impact Effect at Upfront Global. Fresh from her Merseyside Women of the Year Social Impact Award win, Natalie discussed what Social Impact is, tools and tips to measure it and why it's everyone's responsibility.
Started our Summer Merseycare NHS creative writing programme! We won the 10k programme in a very exciting Dragon's Den Style bid!
Delivered creative writing sessions commemorating #SlaveryRemembranceDay2022 at National Museums Liverpool.
Skywriters Ltd was shortlisted in the Best Start Up Business category in Merseyside Independent Business Awards!
September
Natalie was interviewed on BBC Radio Merseyside which aired during The Phillips Hour!
Attended The Female Forum event for #LivLitCycle Lots of fabulous conversation about creativity!
Skywriters Ltd officially became an School for Social Entrepreneurs fellow!
Hosted Bakare Barley Ltd ’s second #TheInclusionExchange podcast “Creating a Culture of Accountability" to mark #NationalInclusionWeek - with Mandeep Rupra as speaker.
Met Arch Bishop Blanch young writers who would be involved in The Ignite Project.
Delivered creative writing at Kulture Day event at the Palm House with The Goddess Projects.
The Muse Room went to Femme De La Femme at Liverpool Everyman🎭It was their first ever event; an all female line up of emerging and award winning comics and even a rap battler! 🙌🏿
October
WE WON BEST START UP AT MERSEYSIDE INDEPENDENT BUSINESS AWARDS!
We had an amazing day celebrating Sefton Park's 150th
Birthday with our Book Treasure Hunt! 📚🍂🍁🌳❤️Over 400 books, over 200 people participating, beautiful weather, amazing support and lovely feedback from participants!Visited the beautiful Shakespeare North Playhouse and had a great meeting with the #LivLitCycle core group!
Skywriters Ltd was nominated in the small organisation category of the Northern Power Women Awards. Plus, our Natalie Denny received multiple nominations in the One to Watch, Future List and Person with Purpose!
We contributed to the #TGPFEST2022 events and activities! A festival for Black women by Black women.
Hosted Bakare Barley Ltd ’s third podcast, Black History and Black Futures, an exploration of an unequal history and the struggles that still exist" with Andrew Lynch.
Delivered sessions at Writing on the Wall’s Write to Work Group talking all things writing and publishing! ✍🏾📚
Had a special night at the beautiful Liverpool Central Library celebrating the launch of the Different Voices Shared Lives book.
Delivered Skywriters Story Glory and EDI sessions at the Teenage Cancer Trust #FYSOT Conference! ✍🏾📚✊🏾
Launched our Reindeer Treasure Hunt, Elf SaveYourself Boxes and Christmas letter packs!
November
Guest speaker at the Hey Firestarters Growth Platform 'Growth for Good' event with a fantastic panel discussing Diversity and Inclusion and how it affects decision-making! 🙌🏿✊🏾
We launched Skywriters Creative Retreats for working class writers. The first one was in partnership with The Goddess Projects for #TGPFEST ✍🏾📚
Had a great day at #BuilderBookUk volunteer session. We made boxes up full of mental health and creative resources for families.
Supported Gateacre School's The_Big_Little Library to give away thousands of books for children and adults this Christmas in their Book Flood at Belle Vale Shopping Centre!
Attended Savera UK Youth at LJMU for the launch of the #OrangeBrickRoad educational video on Harmful Practices
We hosted The Ignite Project Book Launch! What an amazing night! Our wonderful young people who worked for months on the project shared their beautiful book with their family, friends, community and school and planned a fantastic event!
We supported Scouse Christmas Stockings for a third year, our Christmas Stockings Appeal organised by Scouse Solidarity Sisters.
We attended our graduation ceremony for the School of Social Entrepreneurs and performed a special commissioned poem on the SSE experience to commemorate their 10 year anniversary 🎉
December
Had a Winter Wonderland for our Reindeer Treasure Hunt ❄️ 🏔 🌨 🦌🦌🦌
Finished the Year with our SaveYourself elf activities.
Whew! What a year! Here’s to year 3! As always; there’s so much more to come!