Material Matter[s] Co-Build: Cladding our WikiHouse with Timber Shingles

Join us for the final Site As A Classroom Material Matter[s] Co-Build of the year as we finish cladding our on-site WikiHouse structure with locally-sourced timber shingles (open to ages 14+). This picks up where we left off during the Summer Celebration as we continue prototyping ways to co-build the Neighbourhood Public Square together, now and over the years ahead.

We’ll be joined once again by local Woodland Manager Paul Morton of Moreton Woods, who will share insights into regenerative forestry and woodland management while guiding us through the cladding process together.

Alongside this, you’ll also be able to learn more about our experimentation with natural paints on the timber shingles. Working with practitioner Henna Burney, we’ve been testing plant- and mineral-based recipes as healthier alternatives to chemical paints that rely on fossil fuels and release harmful pollutants like VOCs and microplastics into our homes and ecosystems, harming the health of both the human and more-than-human life in our neighbourhoods.

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ABOUT PAUL MORTON, OF MORETON WOODS

Paul Morton is a woodland manager, coppice worker and co runs the woodland business with Jo Callaghan. He specialises in coppice crafts such as woven hazel panels, cleft chestnut gate hurdles and barbecue charcoal, as well as designing and constructing timber buildings. He teaches courses at Moreton Wood as well as other woodlands and sites. Paul has provided training for a number of private individuals as well as through organisations such as the Princes Trust, the Royal Forestry Society, schools and apprenticeship schemes. He is currently providing year long training to an RFS Forestry Roots trainee to be an assistant woodland manager.

Alongside partner Jo, Paul has managed Moreton Wood, a 38.5 acre woodland in Herefordshire, for 21 years. This is an ongoing long-term project of coppice restoration and woodland management to create a sustainable native woodland with rich wildlife habitats, and a network of rides and glades for the benefit of the local community and environment, along with the development of a successful, low impact, traditional woodland enterprise.

For more information about Paul and Jo and Moreton Wood have a look at their website www.moretonwood.co.uk, or read their case study on p.69 of our Building Skills Report as part of the Neighbourhood Public Square proposal.

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Is this for me?
These workshops are open to everyone — no previous experience is required, just an interest in working with others to shape our homes, streets, and neighbourhoods in ways that support the health of us as people and our shared planetary systems.

If you’ve joined us on earlier co-builds, are interested in learning about the intersection of regenerative construction and woodland management, or are joining us for the first time with a mere curiosity, you'll be right at home.

We also welcome makers, builders, and those exploring how natural materials like timber can deepen our relationship with land and each other, as well as support climate, ecological and material transitions across our built environment.

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.

Please note: these workshops are not suitable for children under 14. Young people aged 14–17 must be accompanied by an adult for the full duration of the activity (one adult per young person, for safety).

ABOUT THE SITE

The co-build 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.

— This co-build is only open to adults and children aged 14+

— Children aged under 16 must be accompanied by an adult

— Closed toed shoes or boots must be worn

— 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

— The ground is uneven in places, please navigate carefully and look out for each other

— Toilets will be available off site on Rotton Park Street

— No food or uncovered drinks inside the polytunnel

— Do not go beyond the designated areas, indicated by heras fencing and floor markings

— Please listen and respect any care guidance shared by our team and practitioners on site, for whom your safety if their number one priority

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.

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.

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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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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.