Giving Skipton A Fresh Perspective

If you live in Skipton or visit frequently you may have noticed there’s a bit of extra colour brightening up the walls of Swadford Street and Broughton Road. Fresh Perspective have been working with Heritage Action Zone and GPLD to produce heritage and community-inspired murals which encourage younger audiences to engage with the history of Skipton.

Fresh Perspective is run by Sian Laura and Beth Sculpher – aged 27 and 25, and from the area. The group originally set up by GPLD in 2018 has continued to grow independently under Sian and Beth’s direction. Late last year, they ran a workshop with the children from Broughton Road Community Centre to produce individual tiles with colours and shapes they thought represented Skipton. These shapes were then taken and combined to create the overall mural design and inform the colours for an outdoor mural funded by our ‘Nurturing Creativity’ project which was completed in May this year and is the third mural they have installed in the town, the first and second being located at the new Craven Arts House on Otley Street which is currently in development.

Another mural installed on Swadford Street also completed in May is part of Historic England’s Heritage Action Zone project, which in turn supports and fund’s Fresh Perspective’s Community In Colour project. Working with Craven District Council and Skipton Civic Society, they created a design that is inspired by the colours and shapes of the stained glass windows housed inside the old Ship Hotel above the gate whilst also recreating it in a way that engages young people throughout the town.

Born out of a need to inject some colour into the town and also bring joy through colour and imagery the Community in Colour project aims to highlight the history of certain buildings and locations through colourful murals, patterns and shapes. The end result will be a trail of heritage murals through Skipton which will be available to view on an online map through QR codes placed on each one.

Since producing the murals Sian and Beth have been in demand for more and they recently worked with children from the charity SELFA to produce art pieces which will be brought to life in mural-form inside a bus shelter on Broughton Road so keep your eyes peeled!

As well as painting murals, Fresh Perspective have been supporting the recent Skipton Pride event by helping manage its social media pages and creating content to engage young people in Skipton.

Our aim when we set up Fresh Perspective was it would become independently run by young people and Beth and Sian are always on the lookout for new members to join, so if you’d like to get involved or would like to learn a little more about what Fresh Perspective do please email beth@freshperspective.org.uk.

Photography by Stephen Garnett