The mission at Hoults Yard this year has been to build the ‘village vibe’. We’ve done this through initiating our own cultural programme – art, music, dance. And, we’ve worked hard to provide spaces for other art, music, film and digital players. We’ve had pick-up from all the regional media who have spotted that we don’t see ourselves as ‘landlord’ but more as champion for the local creative sector as a vital part of the regional economy. Austerity Britain still has many challenges, but there is a corner of enterprising Tyneside where nobody is taking it lying down: we are fighting the good fight together!
It is great to hear our clients meet at the post room or cafe or over a beer at one of our events programme. Yesterday, I was chatting to snapper Darren Eddon who had just returned from a press photocall at Ouseburn Farm with Prince Charles (a job he’d been passed by a double-booked fellow Hoults Yard photographer Mike Smith!). We bumped into yard ‘new boy’ Roy Weatherley of Boom Creative who says ‘Are you here as well?’. They’ve worked together for years but it’s hard even for clients on-site to realise the extent of the place with over 50 creative clients in 10 acres across 250,000 sq ft of victorian factory buildings – for which, read ‘rabbit warren’ of passages, rooms, cellars, attics, hidden corridors…
I was standing in the yard on August Bank Holiday Sunday with Nicki Fionda attending the super-busy Habit Urban Festival along with 700 other dance music enthusiasts. She says she gets the same reaction now. ‘Hoults Yard is dead cool. What? You’re based there, Nicki?’ people say to her, to which she replies deftly: ‘Yes, I have been for years and its always been dead cool – what took you so long?!’ Nicki has indeed been a backbone of the NorthEast interior design industry for years, making curtains for high end homes, hotels and restaurants. She has a team that includes upholsterers and stretches to the occasional backdrops for a club nights!
Nicki and I were standing outside Soleheaven.com’s Sneaker Lounge. Not only has the yard got furniture restorers and picture framers, but other workshops and specialist internet retailers are springing up.
SoleHeaven isn’t the only designer fashion player on-site either. There’s a big player, J-Runnin, run by John Leech and team that has some big volumes of trainers and sports stock. John and team also came out to enjoy the delights of Habit’s music festival.
Things continue to hot up with events. More of this in subsequent posts, but we’re now looking at perhaps three events per month for the final quarter of this year, with the expansion of our music activity in partnership with a student promotions team. It’s interesting to see the latent demand for Warehouse venue space with their Facebook page attracting over 3500 friends in its first fortnight.
For the uber-cool, watch out for new launches from our friends at Breaks of 10. We are working on an underground project with them (quite literally) with fashion/art/music initiatives and more installments of our Street Art, TheHoultsYardProject.
In terms of ‘bigging up’ our clients, look no further than Newcastle’s Laing Art Gallery. Our favourite contemporary fine artist of the week, located in Kiln Studio 4, has her own show there in the weeks ahead. Click here for info.
Her studio partner, Susie Green, has just been selected to exhibit in the Newcastle Art Fair - there’s a fancy bit in the middle of the Sage where they showcase a few highly credible modern artists that may not have gallery representation (I think I’m right in saying…).
While we have internet shoe retailers in pairs, we also have some very impressive web design firms in pairs on the yard, too. Take a look at the expansion of Creative Image and/or Boom Creative. Both are recent arrivals and certainly signalling that the economy needs more digital businesses. Digital is where its at! I’m sure they’ll kill me for twinning them in the same paragraph!
What else is going on? This month has seen a flurry of activity from the City Council, keen to follow the Coalition line and get set for Local Enterprise Partnerships. LEP is an unknown quantity, but looks to be replacing Government Office North East (soon to live up to its acronym GONE) and One North East, which is going too! The farewell redundancy volunteers’ emails are already coming in: Thanks for everything Mark Adamson and Ben Strutt and good luck in your next endeavours!
To read the tea leaves on our local LEP, Newcastle City Council have chapter and verse here on their website. The Love-in with Gateshead continues – the town hall meeting I attended recently had Gateshead CEO Roger Kelly and Newcastle’s Regeneration honcho Rob Hamilton. Lots of nodding and agreeing that we need a collective and strong leadership voice – and echoes of support for the region’s other 5 peer LEPs and a Supra-LEP, the North East Growth Partnership.
We shall see… for all my cosying up to the council with an idea or three, the fastest progress this week has come from the Highways Department who want to put a ‘low bridge’ sign on the front railway bridge that’s been 150 years without one. Now doesn’t seem like the best time for our tax money to go on two days of road divert and sign fixing. The council has chosen to increase the carbon footprint of said sign by including warning signs 100 yards either side on Walker Road and each of the signs with lighting.
Lordy me! We’ve spend 15 months asking for permission to get a side gate onto St Lawrence Park so we might sit in the park for picnic lunch – and shave 12 minutes off the walk to the Metro. And, all we’ve achieve is a paper trail with disabled access compliance drawing requirements budget overload stasis. But, there’s no stopping a contractor booked to put up signs!
Perhaps there’s hope in just emigrating, as so many millions of UKIP voters have done over the past 10 years. I’m neither advocating emigration or UKIP, but we have just welcomed the team from Ex-Pat Tax. You might be able to see why this is a growth industry.
Really, though, we’re rooted in Byker and continue to invest. The big building project in the Railhead is almost at an end (very sorry for any disruption or dust caused). So, we’re excited about a new client moving in and creating some 50 jobs in this corner of Deficit Britain. Our thanks go to helpers Howarth Litchfield architects, Harrow building consultants, Mollhann construction – plus clients Jo, Tom, Mike, Lesley and team.
Yes, the Hoults team is tireless at keeping the wheels turning through ice, snow, rain and most recently wind. A warm welcome to our latest team members, Beth and Charlotte – Beth is helping with accounts and Charlotte with events.
