Young Collaborators: Documenting and Design
We have worked with three groups of young people across the project:
Prior Pursglove College students. Several students joined us across two trips, creatively documenting the Teesworks blast furnace sounding, and Skinningrove and Carlin How. Three of them exhibited their work in our project exhibition at Loftus Arts, assisting with the curation and installation of the work.
Hannah Pugh, Prior Pursglove College
Alex Turford, Prior Pursglove College
Welding Students, Redcar & Cleveland College. The group helped to design the steel decorations topping each of the gong stands based on their ideas about places and themes of local significance. These were then cut using water-jet cutting. The students visited the Preston Park Forge and met Master Blacksmith, Peat Oberon. They then hosted Peat at Redcar College, giving him a guided tour of the facilities. Some attended the gong sounding at Redcar Steelworks remains, Teesworks and joined discussions with the older participants who had worked there in the past.
Tees Valley Young Producers at Preston Park. The group documented the forging of the gongs at the Preston Park Forge, also interviewing the blacksmiths, Peat and Matt. They curated and facilitated the public gong sounding and mapping activity at Preston Park in June, 2025. Their photos of the gong making helped us to tell the story of the project to the different community groups we went on to meet.
