Staff receive award for public engagement work

We are delighted that tree members of staff from the School of Design have received recognition in the 2018 Public Engagement with Research Awards

Elizabeth Gaston, Ian Rees and Jane Scott  won this year's Disseminating Research Results award.   The award was received in recongition for work on a specific project, led by Dr Elizabeth Gaston which provided a series of intersecting activities aimed at transforming knowledge and engagement with textiles for schools and pupils in the Yorkshire region. This was a collaboration with The Crafts Council and Leeds Arts University and the programme  was delivered through three activities. Firstly CPD activities for teachers held at in The School of Design, then a series of three 4-day workshops co-designed with schools, and delivered in schools across the region, and finally a public exhibition of outcomes during summer 2018. This PE activity disseminated the findings of recent research by Jane Scott using botanical models of growth to inspire shape changing knitwear (presented at this year's Textile Institute World Conference hosted by The University of Leeds), and the performance craft methodology developed by Elizabeth Gaston and exhibited widely in the UK.

As well as this excellent achievement, we have received funding to support our commitment to public engagement activities. In 2019 we will be running a new "Post Digital Knit" which will explore how kn knit design research  can be used to inform a range of theoretical, practical and pedagogical challenges with the aim of challenging  the conventional thinking around knit for the post digital age.