A shed load of talent with Birmingham City University at Grand Designs Live Stand
Unveiled in front of 50,000 people, the UK premier of eight, unique, customised garden sheds by Birmingham City University stole the show at Grand Designs Live 10-12th October.
Praised by Channel 4 presenter, Kevin Mccloud, for their eco- friendly design, the installation of ‘My Grrreen Shed’ was a new feature for the UK’s biggest homes and garden design show. It featured celebrity designers and a public competition to promote sustainable living.
Birmingham City University invited Channel 4’s Grand Designs presenter Kevin McCloud; interior designer and presenter of ITV’s Dream Homes Oliver Heath; the team at World Wide Fund for Nature; designer and eco campaigner Julia Hales and Chief Executive of West Bromwich Building Society, Stephen Karle, to design their own ‘grrreen’ shed and demonstrate creative ways of making sustainability a winning force in everyday life.
Their five sheds, complimented by three created by Birmingham City University’s MA Course Director in Product Design Graham Powell, formed a new feature that visitors could get up close to, walk around and be inspired by the transformation of the humble garden shed.
It wasn’t just celebrities that took up the University’s design challenge - during the show, visitors also had the chance to create their own dream Grrreen shed. By drawing onto a pre-printed cardboard press out template, which was then assembled into a model shed, hundreds of mini sheds were exhibited en masse to form an impressive spectacle of sustainable ideas. Birmingham City University Level Four Animation students produced the film which shows the hundreds of designs visitors at Grand Designs Live created.
The winner, thirteen year old student Minnie Rinvolveri, will now receive a shed of her own. In choosing the winner Kevin McCloud, said: “It’s been a tough call choosing, with such a wide range of exciting and creative entrants. I was particularly struck by Minnie’s shed which showed a strong marketing message, coupled with a strong design focus integrated with green thinking.”
Joanna Birch, Head of Corporate Relations at Birmingham City University, said: “Letting Grand Designs Live Show visitors loose with sharpie pens to flex their creative muscle on the My Grrreen Shed project was a fun and accessible way for the University to promote an understanding of sustainable design. Asking people to draw is a direct way of engaging with people so that they can think about the benefits of acting in a more sustainable way.”
