Year | 2021
Location | Craft Wood, South Wingfield
Clients | Craft Wood CIC
Summary:
Craft wood is a therapeutic woodland project which specialises in supporting people with additional needs. The focused goal is to help people feel included, supported and assisted by developing a user-orientated approach that embraces the scope of the woods and nurtures interests and life skills, by offering outdoor learning, creative experiences and activities. Craft Wood also hopes to collaborate with young people who are looking for a specialised forest school curriculum that is focused on re-engagement and specially developed programs. They also seek to provide an alternative vocational forest college award in the long run.
As part of their developing engagement programme, 15 students from Sheffield School of Architecture took part in a 6 week project in Spring 2021 to develop a ‘community asset’ for Craft Wood, and improve way-finding on site.
They developed a structure that supports the current management of the site and responds to the users needs. The shelter offers protection from the weather while retaining sense of being outdoors in the woods. It provides a space to greet new site users for the client, and for users to pause, perhaps for a quick sit-down, or to look at the 3D site map, before heading deeper into the forest. The structure has been designed as an adaptable framework which can be customised by the users after the completion of the live project.
The team also came up with innovative ideas for way-finding in the woods, such as the 3D site map housed in the shelter and route markers for the circular paths. These paths are also home to the benches we made using fallen logs to improve site accessibility.
At a more conceptual scale, the team explored a future vision focused on longer-term possibilities for the site. These ideas include the introduction of a camp-ground, look-out towers and arts trail.
The project was an enjoyable and educational experience for the whole group, and they look forward to seeing how the work is received and adapted by the client and the user groups on site.
Credits:
Mentor: Sam Brown
Client: Craft Wood CIC
Location: Craft Wood, South Wingfield
Students: Polly Amery, Lily Bell, Yujie Chen, Tom Donoghue, Irene
Furlanetto, Ben Huckstep, Aroma Kabra, Xiangwenyu Kong, Vincent Las
Marias, Weijing Lyu, John McGrath, Lucy Mills, Mollie Taylor, Lu Xu, Ying
Zuo
