Autumn Assembly Reflections
On the 27 November we hosted an evening of short talks alongside our launch of our 2026 Summer School, at Civic House in Glasgow. It was a wonderful evening of storytelling, reflections and bringing a community together to introduce our initial plans for the summer school. We had six wonderful speakers join us to consider ‘beautiful learning’ experiences they have had in the various stages of their careers.
Rob Colvin started the evening off, talking about 'learning through doing' - and its potential for transformational impact on place and people, drawing on a whole range of interesting experiences, including EASA, where students, learn, play, make, discuss, and self-organise. The V&A Dundee Young People's Collective talked about their recent experiences organising 'Upstart' - a festival of creativity, looping back to a salient quote used in one of their artist commissions; “they tried to bury us, but they didn’t know we’re seeds”. M. Holmes beamed a presentation in from Yale, USA, expanding on a super-dynamic live-build student project which takes place there, and the value of direct engagement with materials, communities and construction. Lily Whitehouse talked about their 'In the Making' project working with the Big Noise charity, and the learning that comes from sharing of expertise, close listening, and kids teaching the architects. Nadia Malekian reflected on the process of screen printing and what architecture can learn from other disciplines, including embracing mistakes, and not being (too) wedded to pre-determined outcomes. Lastly, Becky Little gave an inspiring presentation centring the 'earth as teacher', interweaving stories of people and places, highlighting numerous examples of intelligent ways of working with materials, with a porosity that challenges binaries of us and them - asking 'what would the soil say?'
We would like to take this opportunity to thank;
- Our wonderful speakers for sharing their stories
- Civic House for hosting us
- Soul Food Sisters for their delicious food
- Theodora Van Duin for beautiful photography
and all those who joined us on the evening.