Our Creative Learning programme engages more 10,000 people every year.

Rooted in the rich history and vibrant spaces of Ally Pally, our Creative Learning team co-create a wide range of projects and workshops with local people. Together, we explore creativity, build skills, and support wellbeing.

Our Assistant Creative Learning Producer, Reese Campbell, explains more about the programme and her role in the team.

Before I joined the team I didn’t really know that Ally Pally did community arts projects. One of the most striking things is the breadth of learning activities people can do here. We work a lot with young people, helping them find pathways into careers in the creative industries. Alongside this, we’re also hosting charities who work with people with dementia, or there’s the Ukulele choir, or we are working with local schools and libraries, or showcasing our community through city-wide initiatives like the London Festival of Architecture.

I’ve worked a lot with our Young Creatives Network. We run projects, linking them up with industry professionals who work here, or who are here to run one of our many events. It gives the young people experience that they might not be able to get from going to college or uni.

My personal favourite is our Young Actors Company. It’s been nice to work with the young actors to guide a project from the beginning, through to the end. That means story-boarding and devising things in rehearsals, bringing in a director, progressing through the various stages of production, before delivering performances.

One of the things I’ve found coming into this role is just how much multi-tasking you have to do. My experience before was working as a freelancer on projects. And you can kind of pick up and put down those as you go. But here I might have two or three projects going on at the same time and you’ve really got to prioritise things, plan and keep on top of everything. So that is really good experience for my career development.

Creative Learning delivered the way that we do is so important. I think especially at the moment, we’ve realised, or people are kind of thinking, that university and apprenticeships, those kinds of things, are quite out of reach for a lot of people. People want to do creative things, but they might not have the money all the time. For example, they might not be able to afford a microphone. So being able to have a team that actively takes the time to curate projects across the world of arts is really important. You’re giving that opportunity to get experience and just try something new without people having to worry  ‘oh, I can’t’.

Just having a small impact, can have a really big impact too. Like being given free rehearsal space, Or the relationships I can see members of our network creating as they work.

My favourite space here? I really like the Theatre, it’s really nice. And if it’s not the Theatre, then it’s the Park.

If I had to pick three words to describe Ally Pally? I’d go with: vibrant, interesting, fun.