Building Child Friendly Creative City, together
Engaging more children and young people with arts and creativity
We are thrilled to announce the launch of Child Friendly Creative City - an ambitious three-year £1.5m programme to nurture children and young people's participation in arts, culture and creativity across Nottingham. It has been made possible through funding from the Arts Council, Nottingham Trent University and matched contributions from our partners.
We will strengthen existing arts partnerships and make new connections enabling more children, young people and communities to thrive, create, and be curious! Our programmes will continue to build stronger and deeper connections with and between cross-sector partners.
We will be:
· Listening to what children and young people have to say and take their views seriously in our LOUD and CLEAR projects
· Supporting more educational settings, especially secondaries and alternative providers, to develop the cultural entitlement for all their pupils through our CULTURAL RUCKSACK programme.
· Developing the CREATIVE TASKFORCE by enabling professional development, mentoring support and connections for practitioners, school staff and community advocates.
· Enhancing children’s well-being and understanding through NATURE CONNECTIONS to support environmental creativity at home and abroad.
· Planning for a shared CHILDREN’S FUND, creating a new collective fundraising scheme to enable children and young people to access to arts and culture.
A child-centred rights-based approach
Creativity is also at the heart of Nottingham’s ambition to become a UNICEF Child Friendly City.
Children tell us they want to be part of an inclusive, welcoming city where everyone can flourish and we will be working with community partners to develop festivals, events and platforms to celebrate children and young people.
“Arts and creativity are important to us because they help develop skills and imagination. You can find out things about yourself that you didn’t know before; you never know what you might be good at if you never have the chance to try new things.”
Onab, Year 10, Nottingham Academy.
Everyone has a part to play in building Child Friendly Creative City, join us!
Book your place at this term's teacher INSET!
ChalleNGe is a city-wide partnership of arts organisations, schools and young people. Working with a consortium of arts partners, teachers and community champions, we are on a mission to facilitate more creative activities in schools, neighbourhoods and art spaces across the city.
Families - creative activities
Families - creative activities
Families - creative activities
Discover organisations and groups that offer creative activities for children and young people in the city. Why not try something new? There are arts groups, dance classes, youth theatre and music opportunities all year around - to name but a few!
Read the May Half-term Parent and Carers Newsletter to see a host of creative activities for children, young people and families!
Schools: Cultural Rucksack
Families - creative activities
Families - creative activities
Interested in bringing more creativity to your classroom, or wanting to develop new opportunities for your pupils? From teacher events and CPD to long-term partnerships, ChalleNGe brings you regular updates and boosts your creative connections. 2024/25 Wallplanner
Round-up of arts opportunities & network events: June 2025 Primary teachers newsletter and Secondary teachers newsletter.
Latest News & Opportunities
Bilborough Arts Festival
Bilborough Arts Festival
Bilborough Arts Festival
Sat 28 June - Fri 4 July 2025
A celebration of creativity and community is taking place across Bilborough at the end of June, kicking off with the free Family Fun Day on Sat 28 June in and around Bilborough Library on Bracebridge Drive. Discover activities and community groups meeting throughout the year and take part in taster workshops in community spaces, including Harvey Hadden Sports Village, Beechdale Community Centre, Evolve, Strelley Social Club, St Johns and more!
Find out about Bilborough Arts Festival
Bilborough Arts Festival Brochure
Bulwell Arts Festival
Bilborough Arts Festival
Bilborough Arts Festival
Sat 5 – Sat 12 July 2025
One Vision Partnership proudly presents Bulwell Arts Festival 2025 - a vibrant celebration of the people and places that make Bulwell so special! Now in its 13th year, the festival has grown to showcase the incredible talent and creative spirit within the community. A highlight is the much-anticipated Bulwell Bogs Boat Race, on 5 July 2025, where you can make a boat to launch down the River Leen! The full programme will available soon on the OVP website.
Supported by ChalleNGe, One Vision Partnership and a host of community organisations and artists.
Find out about Bulwell Arts Festival
Bulwell Arts Festival Brochure
Bulwell Arts Festival at a Glance
Thresholds of Time: Bulwell Arts Festival
Fevered Sleep: Dance Opportunity (8-11year olds) FABRIC
Fevered Sleep: Dance Opportunity (8-11year olds) FABRIC
Past, Present and Future Art Project with Helen from Create! Art School
Join three fun, accessible online sessions as part of this year’s Bulwell Arts Festival to explore the architecture of Bulwell, using buildings, doorways, and familiar places as inspiration for imaginative drawings. Draw on your personal memories and local details to create meaningful, expressive artwork. This is for adults and children.
Join live on:
Sat 5 July, 6:00–7:00pm
Mon 7 July, 7:00–8:00pm
Thurs 10 July, 10:00–11:00am (or catch up via recording)
You will need a pencil, rubber, sharpener, ruler, 2 x A4 paper, scissors, glue, coloured pencils or felt tips.
Fevered Sleep: Dance Opportunity (8-11year olds) FABRIC
Fevered Sleep: Dance Opportunity (8-11year olds) FABRIC
Fevered Sleep: Dance Opportunity (8-11year olds) FABRIC
'Time Keeps the Drummer'
Closing Date: 14 July 2025
Fevered Sleep are seeking a cast of confident children to be in a new show, ‘Time Keeps The Drummer’, a playful, physical performance that’s all about time. Auditions in Nottingham on 19 & 20 July and rehearsals will be over October 2025 half-term. The show is part of Nottdance 2025 festival, held by FABRIC this Autumn. The local cast will work with award-winning artistic directors to make a performance special to Nottingham.
Previous dance experience isn’t required. Applications from disabled and neurodivergent children are encouraged. To discuss access needs and support before registering for an audition workshop, please email admin@feveredsleep.co.uk
Find out more about 'Time Keeps The Drummer' by Fevered Sleep - FABRIC
For Teachers:
Culturemeets online
A-Z Directory for schools
A-Z Directory for schools
We bring teachers and arts professionals together for termly online network meetings called CultureMeets. We begin with 5min presentations from arts organisations about their upcoming exhibitions, workshops and resources before a themed discussion.
See all past Culturemeets here. Contact hello@challengenottingham.co.uk if you are a teacher and want to book a 1:1 conversation.
A-Z Directory for schools
A-Z Directory for schools
A-Z Directory for schools
Nottingham's Cultural Rucksack encourages the development of high quality partnerships between arts, cultural and heritage providers and schools - embedding a range of rich and diverse experiences to bring your curriculum to life.
Nottingham's schools are signing up to become 'Cultural Rucksack schools' - supporting their pupils to feel connected and valued by their city. Find out more about becoming a CR school here.
Creativity Collaboratives
A-Z Directory for schools
Creativity Collaboratives
Nottingham's Creativity Collaboratives programme has involved 12 schools exploring and embedding approaches around 'Teaching for Creativity' over 3 years. Watch our Yr 3 FILM
Find out more about the Creative Practitioners and read our latest case studies.
See the Creativity Exchange website and Leading for Creative Thinking website for inspiration, links and resources.
City-wide collaborative projects
Art of Belonging
Child Friendly Nottingham
Celebrating Languages
Art of Belonging is a city-wide programme that seeks to welcome refugees and asylum seekers in Nottingham. The Art of Belonging Pledge has now been signed by 14 arts organisations and we have a growing network of creative practitioners who are being supported to facilitate sessions with new arrivals. From partnership projects with NEST (the Nottingham Education Sanctuary team) and arts venues, to the Refugee Roots regular creative programme and collaborations with Nottingham Playhouse, NAE and more - there are many ways you can support this work and get involved.
Celebrating Languages
Child Friendly Nottingham
Celebrating Languages
We're delighted to be working in partnership with schools, communities, arts partners and our two Universities to celebrate our diverse languages and dialects in Nottingham.
Thanks to funding from NTU, 8 partnership projects have been supported to explore new partnerships between arts organisations, schools and community groups to highlight and celebrate Languages within their work.
We are also excited to be the Community partner for a Co(l)laboratory and welcome Jack Benjamin as our PhD researcher.
Child Friendly Nottingham
Child Friendly Nottingham
Child Friendly Nottingham
Child Friendly Nottingham is a city-wide partnership programme to put children's rights into practice. Lots of organisations are supporting children and young people to have a meaningful say in local decisions, services and spaces. Training and resources from UNICEF are available for teams and organisations to get involved.
Over 9000 children and young people collaborated to choose 3 'badges' (areas to focus on) which are: Safe and Secure; Education & Learning and Healthy. 'Equal and included is the golden thread, linking all our work together.
RSE Day
Child Friendly Nottingham
Every year, we work in partnership with Catherine Kirk from Nottingham City Council on developing a collaborative schools project and resources to celebrate Relationship & Sex Education (RSE) Day.
For 2025, the theme is 'Communicate' focusing on healthy, positive communication in relationships. Together we have commissioned artist Millie Yarwood to gather children and young people’s views and create a mural in the Arboretum. Millie has also run a creative CPD session for teachers.
Find out about the work of the Achieve Well Team and get involved!
Connecting Notts
Connecting Notts is our Youth Cultural Partnership that meets monthly to bring together representatives from ChalleNGe arts and community partners (16-26 year olds) to collaborate and engage the next generation of cultural leaders in the city.
Facilitated by ChalleNGe and Upstart Projects (who also run Voice Mag) members of Connecting Notts plan events for a wider network of young people, to better connect, network and shape arts opportunities and professional development for young people.
Bulwell Arts Festival
We believe that art opportunities should be on every child's doorstep, in neighbourhoods, schools and parks - as well as within the fabulous arts venues of our city.
We work in close partnership with Bulwell Arts Festival (hosted by One Vision Partnership) and Bilborough Arts Festival - supporting local creative activities in community centres, schools and libraries in the run up to their annual Art festivals.
Check out the 2025 brochures for both festivals!
