YOU&ME were commissioned by South Somerset District Council to create a series of community-led public artworks as part of the Yeovil Refresh programme — a major transformation of the town’s public spaces.

The project reimagined Yeovil’s town centre with a newly designed public realm featuring planting, trees, and a central amphitheatre with an outdoor performance space and water feature. Our artworks added a vibrant and welcoming layer to these changes, helping to shape a renewed sense of place and a distinctive visual identity for Yeovil — inspired by the people who live and work there.

Working in collaboration with poet Beth Calverley, we invited local groups to share their memories, feelings and hopes for Yeovil’s future through a series of poetry co-creation sessions. These conversations were shaped into typewritten poems, which became an integral part of the final enamelled artwork totems. Poetry was incorporated into the concrete seating steps and a community co-created map formed window vinyls within a vacant unit.

Alongside the poetry sessions, YOU&ME ran collage and Yeovil shape collecting workshops with Performing Arts students from Yeovil College and aerospace trainees from Leonardo, the local helicopter manufacturer. The creative outcomes from these sessions were later showcased in an interactive exhibition at Yeovil Art Space in July 2021.

(Image selection includes images courtesy of LHC design,  Richard Tomlinson and Yeovil Art Space.)

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