Making Community Tiles with Reclaimed Clay: Lessons from P.I.P Tiles Group

Join ceramic artist Alice Thatcher and members of the P.I.P Tiles steering group from the Portland Inn Project in Stoke-on-Trent for a hands-on workshop sharing their process co-designing and producing ceramic tiles with the neighbours to be installed inside ‘PIP’ — their streets’ future community space and cultural building in the form of a retrofitted former derelict pub.

Leading a practical and explorative production session, Alice and neighbours will be taking a deep dive into the PIP Tiles project. This will include sharing insight into the early consultation process, the decision making along the way, the conscious material choices, the artist and expert collaborations and the making itself.

The team will be bringing their clay extruder, reclaimed clay (excavated from the underbelly of their future PIP space) and home-made glazes for people to get hands-on with making and glazing tiles for PIP's future bathrooms.

ABOUT P.I.P CIC

The Portland Inn Project CIC is a creative arts project for a community in Stoke-on-Trent with an aim to achieve community cohesion, economic, social and cultural development by involving the community in development of a pioneering community space, cultural hub and social enterprise.

ABOUT PIP TILES PROJECT

P.I.P CIC are co-designing and producing ceramic tiles to be installed inside ‘PIP’ – their future community space and cultural building.Starting with the ground floor bathrooms - artist Alice Thatcher is working with a steering group of local residents to design and create tiles for the space, drawing on their existing ceramic skills whilst supporting residents to learn new skills in ceramic tile production.

ABOUT ALICE

Alice Thatcher is a ceramic artist working with clay and people in Stoke-on-Trent. She also works as an artist and Creative Producer at The Portland Inn Project CIC. Her practice focuses on community, clay, people and place. She believes in the connections we can make using ceramic processes and is passionate about engaging with others whilst using clay as a tool for conversation.

Alice will be joined on the day with neighbours from the PIP Tiles Project.

IS THIS FOR ME?

If you haven't done anything like this before but are interested to participate, you are warmly welcome to join us. No previous experience is required — just an interest in working with those around you to shape your homes, streets, and neighbourhoods together in ways that support those who live there to thrive in balance with the natural world around them.

If you’re interested in how making can strengthen our relationships to each other, the land and the materials that make up our places, or how reclaimed materials like clay can be reused with care and imagination, this workshop will be a great fit.

If you’re a ceramicist or have skills working with clay and are curious about supporting or learning from a community tile-making project, this is a great opportunity to connect, share, and explore future possibilities together.

If you’re excited by the power of making with many hands and want to explore how collaborative processes like this could work in your own community, come along and get stuck in.

We particularly welcome those who are based in or around Ladywood and interested to co-design and co-build the Neighbourhood Public Square together with us, are involved in the co-design and building of civic spaces in their own neighbourhoods, or are interested in retrofit at the street and neighbourhood scale.

These workshops are not suitable for children under 11 years of age, and children aged 11+ must be accompanied by an adult for the full duration of the activity. For safety, this will need to be one adult in attendance per young person on site.

ABOUT THE SITE

This session takes place in and around the polytunnel on the Neighbourhood Public Square site. As we prepare to begin the construction of Neighbourhood Public Square together, we are very committed and excited to keep the site as open as possible. In order to make this work, we invite you to adopt new postures together with us and adhere to some important principles for taking care and keeping each other safe on site.

— All activity on site is only open to adults and children over the age of 11

— Children aged 11—17 must be accompanied by an adult

— Please note the site currently has no toilet facilities*

— There is level access across the site, but the ground is uneven in places, so please do navigate this carefully, and look out for each other too

— Closed toed shoes must be worn on site for your safety

— We will also provide any additional safety equipment that is required on your arrival, including hi vis vests which are to be worn at all times on site

If further information would support your visit, please contact Emily on emilycz@civicsquare.cc.

You can also let us know about any specific access requirements you may have during the sign up process, and where possible we will of course seek to meet these, whilst also being honest about the limitations of the current infrastructure where needed to ensure you have any information you may need before attending.

*Toilets are available nearby at Ladywood Leisure Centre and Reservoir Cafe (subject to opening times). We are working to bring further infrastructure to support more visitors to the Neighbourhood Public Square site as soon as possible, including compost toilets, and acknowedge and appreciate your patience as these upgrades become possible.

We thank you for your understanding and collaboration whilst we hold the constraints and opportunities of working in close proximity to former industrial buildings which are currently undergoing surveys to gain a full picture of their condition, whilst we keep trying to practice as openly as possible together during this time, and throughout the construction stages to come.

ABOUT MATERIAL MATTER[S]

Material Matter[s] is an ongoing open enquiry into how we fundamentally reimagine our relationships with materials and the systems that shape how they are made, distributed, and considered at their ‘end-of-life’ through a lens of material justice.

As we develop the strategies, relationships and practical skills needed to manifest the regenerative design principles within the retrofit of the Neighbourhood Public Square, this enquiry opens out our material explorations into a site of shared (un)learning, reimagination and capacity building.

We invite you to join us on this journey and to bring your own enquiries, curiosities and skills, as we collectively grow our material literacy, hands-on skills and collective capacities to co-lead and steward a just material transition in our homes, streets and neighbourhoods.

If you're interested in reading more about this work so far, head to our recent research publication with Material Cultures — Building Skills: A Material Strategy for Birmingham and the West Midlands.

Open enquiries are one layer of Site As A Classroom, a long-term collective practice to ensure everyday phase of Neighbourhood Public Square is an opportunity to learn together.

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ABOUT SITE AS A CLASSROOM

Site As A Classroom is a long-term collective practice to ensure every phase of designing, building, repairing and stewarding the Neighbourhood Public Square site is an open, inclusive, and shared opportunity for learning together in our neighbourhood and beyond.

"Together, we are a commitment to this land as a site of reimagination, reuse and repair; a place to learn, build, eat, grow, care and organise; a home for the capacities, skills and relationships we need to face the challenges and possibilities ahead together, held in common for the neighbourhood for generations to come."

—Neighbourhood Public Square: The Land Story So Far

Our intention is for our team, the neighbourhood, and wider national and industrial scales to learn from the ongoing demonstration through Neighbourhood Public Square in real-time, as well as informing how we learn from what the site, ecoregion, neighbourhood, peers, and precedents can continue to teach us, without end.

This builds on so many experiences we have shared with you all so far including Doughnut Economics Peer-To-Peer Learning Journeys, Ecological Health in Neighbourhoods, Neighbourhood Trade School, Material Matter[s], Re:Builders, Retrofit Reimagined, learning from Centre For Alternative Technology, The Rediscovery Centre, Le Magasin Électrique, Ubele Initiative, Freedom & Balance, and countless others.

Launching more formally in May 2025, Site As A Classroom is an open invitation to bring the skills you have, your energy, curiosity, and lived wisdoms to help shape and co-produce this next phase of discovery and demonstration together through everyday participation, co-builds and a range of open enquiries that we are excited to share in together.

Find out more: bit.ly/PublicSquareDesign

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