Now in its sixth year, Squire & Partners’ award-winning Winter Windows is an annual collaboration between a group of children and designers from the practice. The installation challenges children to design neon winter shapes which are transformed into lights and displayed in the windows of The Department Store.
Now in its sixth year, Squire & Partners’ award-winning Winter Windows is an annual collaboration between a group of children and designers from the practice. The installation challenges children to design neon winter shapes which are transformed into lights and displayed in the windows of The Department Store.
For 2022, half of the window illuminations were designed by Jubilee Primary School in Brixton and the other half by Harlem-based Living Redemption Youth Opportunity Hub, in celebration of Brixton and Harlem’s twinning. The same series of expressive lights will also be displayed on Harlem’s 125th Street, amplifying our special ‘bond across the pond.’ Created over several workshops, both groups were asked to propose designs based on ‘Wonderland’ – the theme for the Brixton BID’s 2022 Winter Festival, inspired by Brixton House Theatre’s inaugural winter performance of Alice in Wonderland.
The first workshop – held online for both the Brixton and Harlem-based children to watch – introduced the students to Lewis Carroll’s novel and the concept of designing abstract shapes based around their interpretation of the theme. A second workshop was held Downstairs at The Department Store for Jubilee Primary School, and at the Living Redemption Youth Opportunity Hub for the Harlem group of young people. The workshop focussed on testing and working up a final design into one continuous line which could be stretched across three planes to create a 3D shape. Armed with coloured pens, string and pipe cleaners, the children progressed their designs and presented their final idea.
A panel of judges from Squire & Partners and the Living Redemption Youth Opportunity Hub selected four shapes each, which varied from a magic aeroplane to underwater creatures.The final designs included Tweedledee and Tweedledum, a spiralling vortex, a mushroom, a trio of lollipops, a white rabbit, a top hat and a Queen of Hearts card. Squire & Partners’ model makers and Harlem’s Living Redemption group made each bespoke 3D light by weaving neon flex through a wire mesh frame comprised of three planes. This transformed the students’ sketches into physical light installations, exactly as drawn.
Winter Windows forms part of Brixton’s Winter Festival and is a new addition to Harlem’s “Unity and Peace” holiday theme. The two installations will be on show throughout the winter months to bring light to both communities.
Team Jubilee Primary School, Living Redemption Youth Opportunity Hub, Squire & Partners Modelshop team
