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 CAN YOU OFFER SOME HELP?:
Creative Stoke is independent, un-funded
and non profit-making. We welcome offers of....
press coverage or free advertising space
volunteer reviewers & talented event-photographers
free tickets to your event
slots for interviews & media appearances
business sponsorship & partnerships
funding opportunities
creative-industries consultancy & mapping commissions
Please make contact, initially through our
e-mail form. Thanks!
FAQ / ABOUT THE SITE:
"Who is it aimed at?" Creative Stoke is mainly aimed at
local creatives, and at those who wish to discover them.
By "local" we mean a circular area of
roughly 10 miles radius around Stoke (see a map).
This embraces much of North Staffordshire,
a region which sits at a comfortable distance from both Manchester and Birmingham,
and which has a population of around 500,000 people.
"Why did you do this?" Because it needed to be done;
done properly, done long-term, and done by people who care. Recent
surveys show that 78% of creatives see contact/networking with
other creative people as their priority. We hope Creative Stoke is a first step
toward meeting this need.
"Who created the site?"
David is a professional artist & photo-journalist,
and a university lecturer at UCE's BIAD.
Simon (photo)
is a recent graduate, used to run a commercial actors agency in the city, and now works for a media production company.
"Who funds the site?" Creative Stoke is independent, un-funded,
run by volunteers, and is non profit-making.
"What are your initial aims?" The first and very simple aim
was to stomp down hard on the growing myth that our area was "a cultural desert".
Secondly, we want to give local creatives and patrons an easy way
to discover and contact each other.
Thirdly, we hope the site might attract the attention of
some of the many creatives who seem set to
flee London
to 2010. We know what the new creative class values
-- affordable authentic old buildings,
major art & design universities (and their steady output of
talented graduate employees), rugged countryside & active sports,
friendly locals, a centuries-deep tradition of creative design,
broadband net access, a large
potential client base, good transport links to other cities. We
know we have all that here, and we want to tell people
about it.
"You cover all the areas/towns around Stoke too - so why call it Creative Stoke?"
It's about recognition of the name. A small but crucial part of our aim
is to entice young creative people from outside
the area to look at what is going on here. These people
may be vaguely aware of roughly where 'Stoke' is and that it's a city,
because of the football team & Robbie Williams - but almost certainly won't
recognise the names 'North Staffordshire', 'Moorlands', or 'The Potteries'.
"What is the site's history?" Creative Stoke began as a very plain
web-page of 50 web-links. That page 'went live' at Christmas 2001, but only covered the
visual & media arts. Over the next six months that prototype page grew to 300 web-links,
all categorised and annotated. Artists events and a courses guide
were added in early 2002. By Summer 2002 it had become clear that there was a real need for
a credible & up-to-date web-site which spotlighted all
the production-led creative activity in the area.
We then contacted the regional Design Initiative about Creative Stoke
- but had no reply. So it was decided to expand
Creative Stoke to cover all production-led Creative
Industries activity in & around Stoke. The domain-name
www.creativestoke.org.uk was registered, and
the initial design & development work was done for the new expanded site.
In October 2002 a talented graduate
Millennium Volunteer
was brought in to help with the expansion process, aided
by free broadband-&-PC time courtesy of Kath & Torben at the Burslem School of
Art. In late December 2002 the development and research work was completed
and the new site 'went live' to the world. In the months after the launch
we had a great response, and were able to add hundreds of new links.
In December 2003 we celebrated the site's first birthday, and found
the Directory had grown to nearly 1000 links. In 2004/5 Creative Stoke
was a partner in delivering an innovative £100k community-arts project
in Stoke, Creative Approaches to Local Issues;
we were invited to submit a funding bid as part of a Council application to a major Lottery
fund; we recieved a £900 grant to
attend the Creative Clusters
international conference in Brighton, and a further £500 grant to
help promote Creative Stoke using posters in early 2005. Throughout 2005 we continued
to develop and refine the site, and added RSS news feeds in Spring 2006.
WHY YOU SHOULD BECOME INVOLVED IN OUR CITY:
Stoke-on-Trent is a unique and very affordable
place for creatives to live & work, with many opportunities
to learn and teach. Like any British city these days, it
has its problems. But it also has certain unique advantages....
A COMPACT CITY: Stoke is a medium-sized city of 240,000 people, with
strong & long-established distinctive local communities.
The wider
North Staffordshire area is home to around 470,000 people.
Stoke has the youngest age profile of any British city, and
the city's population is expected to grow to 253,500 by 2006/7.
About 9000 firms are based in the city.
AN ARTISAN CITY:
North Staffordshire is the world centre for fine ceramics - a skilled
design trade established here since the 12th Century, giving us artistry
skills that are ten generations deep. In the 90s the industrial
ceramics sector suffered the decline of many old firms, but
in December 2003 The Independent newspaper judged that...
"Stoke-on-Trent continues to thrive as a centre of creativity", and that many smaller designer-maker & heritage potteries are thriving.
The Stoke area is home to thousands of degree-level students
learning the creative & media arts at three major universities; Keele,
Staffordshire, and MMU at Alsager. The city is also home to the largest F.E. college in England, which has a
specialist media-production campus at Burslem.
SPORTS, CYCLING & WALKING: Stoke is a very sports-focussed city, with
two major league football teams in huge new stadiums.
Three national long-distance SUSTRANS cycle-routes converge on Stoke, and there are
high-grade canalside cycle-routes which complement an extensive
network of off-road "greenways" following the lines of old
mineral railways. In August 2004 the
largest mountain-bike race in the UK
returned to Stoke for the third year in a row.
NATURE: The city
has the most 'green space' per person of any British city, and 25 miles of paved off-road cycle-paths. Stoke is also surrounded on all sides by
some of the most beautiful countryside in England - a countryside & city 'blend'
which potentially offers new markets, networks and opportunities
for savvy creative professionals. Stoke is adjacent to the
Staffordshire Moorlands and
The Peak District national park, the
Roaches (famous rock climbing area), features the Staffordshire Way
long-distance footpath, and is within easy reach of the new 200 sq-mile National Forest around Burton-upon-Trent --
all offering authentic experiences & challenging activities.
Nearer home, the city's restored canals are also part of the attractions
that bring over 4 million tourists into Stoke-on-Trent
each year, supporting around 7000 jobs in the city.
AFFORDABLE HOUSING: Some of the most affordable
terraced houses in England can
be found here, due to the demise of the traditional steel & coal mining
industries. A Victorian or Edwardian terrace house in Stoke-on-Trent averaged £70,618 at the end of June 2005 (Source: HM Land Registry, Q2 05 figures) -
and prices continue to rise fiercely.
Studio / warehouse / gallery / loft space is equally affordable to buy & renovate, especially for
creatives who are re-locating after selling property in the South East.
EXPRESS TRAINS: The city is within easy reach of the world-class
arts & media resources of both Manchester (45 mins by train) and
England's 2nd-city Birmingham (52 mins by train). Virgin doubled
train frequency from Stoke to Birmingham & Manchester in Autumn 2002.
Virgin introduced its new fleet of high-speed 'Super Voyager' trains on the
improved West Coast Main Line in Spring 2005 - bringing North
Staffordshire into the London commuter belt for the first time,
by cutting journey times from Stoke-on-Trent to London to
just 83 minutes.
ACCESS TO CLIENTS & BUYERS: The West Midlands is home to over 5 million people,
making it bigger in population than Ireland, Norway or Denmark.
You can have face-to-face
access to literally millions of potential clients / art buyers. The surrounding areas of the Peak District National Park, Stone, and South Cheshire
are some of the most affluent on the UK. In
addition, the huge city of Manchester is nearby to the north, and
Nottingham is within striking distance to the east of Stoke.
The M6 motorway passes very close to Stoke, and in December 2002 the Government
announced £1.3-billion to add a new four-lane toll motorway
which will parallel the M6 from Birmingham to Manchester.
Birmingham International Airport has a frequent Virgin train
service direct to Stoke-on-Trent.
THE 'GREEN SHOOTS' OF GROWTH SUCCESS:
* In Q4 2002 the Barclays Small Business Survey found that
the ST postcode produced more start-up businesses (per 1000 population, counting only
£50k+ pa VAT-registered firms) than Manchester, and just as many
as the nearby hi-tech Telford new town. In 2004, the Royal Mail Map of Business
Start-ups (covering all firms inc. self-employed) found that the number
of local start-ups here had increased by more than almost anywhere else in the UK.
* KPMG's Competitive Alternatives 2004 report declared Stoke-on-Trent
to be the most cost-effective place to set up a new UK business.
* North Staffordshire
has the Midlands' largest concentration of professional-services firms outside Birmingham.
* In 2003 a DEMOS report found that the city of Stoke-on-Trent (not counting Newcastle-under-Lyme)
was in the UK's top-twenty for Patent Applications.
* The city's present employment levels are currently
stable and likely to grow from 2004-2008, according to a detailed 2003
study by Experian Business Strategies.
* In the year to June 2004,
commercial land values soared by 40% to £240k an acre.
* Stoke sits at the heart of
an area which is very affluent and attracting jobs & income growth -
the adjacent Peak District & the nearby town of Stone were both
in the "top 15" areas of new UK wealth 'hotspots' in a June 2004 Financial Times study.
FIND OUT MORE:
Come for a visit !
The Stoke-on-Trent area welcomes four million tourists every year.
Or have a look at a few key non-arts links....
:: Stoke Tourist Board &
the Staffordshire Moorlands Tourism.
:: The Sentinel newspaper.
:: BBC Stoke
:: inStaffs - the Staffordshire inward-investment agency.
:: Trentham Gardens in Stoke-on-Trent - currently going through a
£100-million makeover to create one of the top tourism destinations
in the country, complementing North Staffordshire's world-famous Alton Towers theme-park & gardens.
:: Shimano '24 Hour Sleepless in the Saddle',
the largest mountain-bike race in the UK, with over 2000 competitors.
It's been held in Stoke-on-Trent for three years now - and is happening
here again over two days in August 2005. Excitement-on-wheels fans might also like to check out the
Stoke Skateboarders,
Cycle 2000,
and the Stoke Mountain Bike Club.
:: The Peak District National Park
starts 9 miles from Stoke city centre. (Among many other beautiful things, the Park contains the
earliest evidence of art in Britain; a 12,000 year old line drawing
of a horse's head & neck, drawn onto a piece of bone
found in a cave).
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