2024-03-31-accounts

Company number: 05435630 Charity Number: 1112094

The Glass-House Community Led Design

Report and financial statements For the year ended 31 March 2024

The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Reference and administrative information	1
Directors’ report	2
Independent examiner's report	35
Statement of financial activities (incorporating an income and expenditure account)	37
Balance sheet	38
Notes to the financial statements	39

The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Company number 05435630 Charity number 1112094 Registered office Mainyard Studios and operational 35 Bow Road address London E3 2AD Country of United Kingdom incorporation Directors Prue Chiles Chair Susannah Davis Robert Johnson Alexander Sainsbury Key management Sophia de Sousa Chief Executive personnel Secretary Sophia de Sousa Bankers CAF Bank Ltd 25 Kings Hill Avenue Kings Hill West Malling ME19 4JQ Solicitors Portrait Solicitors 1 Chancery Lane London WC2A 1LF Independent Noelia Serrano Examiner Sayer Vincent LLP Chartered Accountants 110 Golden Lane London EC1Y 0TG

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

The Directors, who also act as Trustees for charity law purposes, submit their annual report and the financial statements of The Glass-House Community Led Design for the year ended 31 March 2024. The Directors confirm that the annual report and financial statements of the Charity comply with current statutory requirements, the requirements of the Charity's governing document and the provisions of the Statement of Recommended Practice (SORP) 'Accounting and Reporting by Charities'.

Structure, governance and management

The Glass-House Community Led Design, which is a Registered Charity (1112094) and a Company Limited by Guarantee (05435630), is constituted through its Memorandum and Articles of Association.

The Board of Directors currently has four appointed members, who give their time to the Charity on a voluntary basis. The Directors of the Company during the year are set out in the legal and administrative information on page 1. The current Directors are Prue Chiles (Chair), Susannah Davis, Robert Johnson (Chair of Finance Committee) and Alex Sainsbury.

Either existing Directors or senior staff members may propose potential new Directors. The Chair and at least one other member interview each potential Director. If approved, potential Directors attend a meeting of the Board of Directors as an observer. Directors may subsequently be appointed by a unanimous vote on an ordinary resolution at a quorate meeting of the Charity’s Board of Directors. There is an established process for the induction of Directors. All new Directors are provided with an induction pack containing relevant documentation as recommended by the Charity Commission. The Board carries out regular governance reviews of the Board and its functions.

The Directors appoint a Chief Executive to manage the day-to-day activities of the Charity.

Risk management

The Charity has assessed the governance, operational, financial, and external risks, as well as those related to compliance with law and regulation. Where appropriate, the Charity has consulted external experts to ensure that the systems and structures in place meet standards and regulations. The Charity has established a clear set of Financial Policies and Procedures adhering to guidance from the Charity Commission, as well as a Financial Reserves Policy appropriate to the risks of the Charity. A comprehensive review of the risks is carried out on an annual basis.

Related parties

One of the Charity’s Directors (Alex Sainsbury) is also on the board of the Charity’s main core funder, The Glass-House Trust. See note 8 for further information.

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Objectives and activities

The Principal objects of the Charity are:

• the advancement of education in matters relating to urban design, including by offering advice, information, training and project support to community, tenants and residents groups throughout the UK in matters relating to urban design.

• the maintenance, improvement or provision of public amenities in areas of social and economic deprivation, in the interests of urban and rural regeneration, through the support and promotion of public participation in the design of the built environment and public spaces.

Mission and approach

We want to make great places a reality for everyone.

We connect people with the design of their places, and connect design with people. Our work is focused on supporting communities, organisations and networks to work collaboratively on the design of buildings, open spaces, homes and neighbourhoods.

We see design not only as a tool for creating great places, but also as a way to connect people and to empower them with enhanced confidence, skills, and a greater sense of agency.

We work openly and collaboratively across disciplines and sectors to develop research, projects, events and practical resources. We are committed to sharing the learning from our work to help affect change for people, places and practice.

What we do

Champion: We are an independent advocate for the value of empowering design practices and for the importance of design quality and its effect on people’s quality of life.

• Empower: We empower people and organisations through design by building new skills and confidence that give people the agency to contribute to and lead inclusive local change.

Connect: We use design to bring people together to work collaboratively to improve their places and support local relationships and networks that help build community.

Innovate: We test new ideas and methodologies with partners, projects, and places and share what we learn to inform and innovate design practice.

Areas of work

Improving places

We enable a wide range of people and organisations to work together to shape places, such as the design of new housing, revitalising a green space or transforming a community building.

Our independent, hands-on support helps to build confidence and capacity, to inspire, and to give people the agency to improve the quality of their neighbourhoods.

Innovating practice

We inject new approaches and processes that enhance the social and economic impact of designing places and inform policy and practice.

Our support empowers organisations to rethink their culture and practice to support a more open and collaborative approach to shaping places.

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Action research

We undertake action research with partners across sectors and disciplines to explore the value and impact of empowering design practices in supporting people and places.

Through our collaborations with partners and the communities engaged with our research, we develop and share new knowledge, tools and resources.

Supporting dialogue

We create and facilitate interactive events and activities that help people from different backgrounds and professions work together and learn from each other.

We also share our work on empowering design practices at conferences, workshops, lectures and other events that explore the connections between people and places.

When planning our activities for the year, the Directors have considered the Charity Commission’s guidance on public benefit. The Glass-House works to ensure that our programmes are inclusive, accessible and responsive to the needs of our beneficiaries. We also aim to ensure that any support that we offer brings benefit not only to the direct participants, but also to a broad crosssection of the communities in which their projects are based. We are also committed to ensuring that our work supports innovation, and the production and sharing of learning.

Allocation of resources to beneficiaries

The Glass-House offers free or subsidised enabling and support to community groups and organisations through a number of different programmes.

The Glass-House delivers a programme of free events, which includes our national Glass-House WEdesign Series and other workshops, seminars and events. We generally offer open registration to these on a first come, first served basis.

The Glass-House also offers some free or subsidised project-based support and training to selected communities, which is sometimes made possible through theme-based funded programmes. All this support is accessed through a both rigorous and responsive process to assess eligibility of groups and projects, managed by the Charity’s staff and relevant partners. Applicants are interviewed and/or visited by one or more members of staff, and information assessed by at least two members of staff. The staff team reports regularly to the Chief Executive and the Board of Directors on both projects being considered and resource allocations made. All support given has clear terms and conditions attached and is subject to rigorous monitoring and evaluation. Above all, there is the expectation that we will capture and share learning from each of these projects, and that those we support will work with us to help ensure that the work we do with them can benefit others as well.

In some cases, our free support to communities is linked to the collaborative action research programmes we deliver with higher education and third sector partners. This allows us to both provide practical support on the ground in communities, and to extract and disseminate learning to contribute to the growing evidence base and movement of community-led, participatory and collaborative design of place.

We also offer training and enabling support to communities through commissioned services. We choose only those commissioned projects that contribute to our mission. All funds generated through commissioned work are invested back into meeting our charitable objectives.

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Report on activities 2023/24

Being ambitious about the future of The Glass-House

Our strategic plan set five key strategic objectives for 2021-2024:

1. Be catalytic to affect change (Choose and make opportunities for targeted action that has a significant impact)

2. Champion, challenge, provoke and inspire (Constantly ask people to reflect, reconsider and imagine)

3. Maximise impact through collaboration (Build on existing partnerships to create new opportunities and to extend our impact and reach)

4. Widen practice and build legacy (Further develop, articulate and share our stories, practice and tools to develop our shareable resources and archive)

5. Nurture Glass-House team & champions Ensure that working for and with The Glass-House helps people to build the confidence and skills to support and enable The Glass-House mission

As we reach the end of the period of this strategic plan, we can look back on three years in which we have achieved a great deal and made significant strides towards our strategic objectives. As always, we have chosen to work on projects where we feel we can make a difference, innovate and extract and share learning. We continue to enable and inspire discussion and debate. Our national public programme of events and think pieces, and accompanying student programme, is growing each year, with increasing numbers of those taking part, and with increasing contributions to educating emerging built environment professionals.

We have continued to develop practical resources to enable others to do what we do, and to inject them both into practice and communities. We have begun work with an archivist on a digital asset management system that will both serve our organisation and provide a public facing resource bank of The Glass-House work, learning tools and methods. Through our strategic partnership with The Open University and work with other research partners, we are setting an example of how to develop and deliver truly co-designed and co-produced interdisciplinary research and are laying the foundations for significant muti-year projects with a broad spectrum of partners looking forward.

This year saw us deliver another rich programme of activities, grounded in our ongoing commitment to innovation, capturing and sharing learning and to partnership working. As always, it is clear to us that there is too much for us to achieve on our own. We must continue to work with partners and to empower others with the confidence, methods and approaches and the evidence required to drive systemic change to empower communities in and through design and to support cross-sector collaboration in placemaking. We must continue to experiment and innovate, and to inspire and enable others in this field to do the same. This will guide our new 5-year strategy, which we will touch on later in the document.

What follows is a snapshot of our work in 2023/24.

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Supporting Dialogue

The Glass-House is unusually positioned to bring together a range of voices and perspectives from communities, practice, policy, research and education to explore ideas, to bring experiences and ideas together through discussion and debate, and to challenge the status quo. We create a range of safe and accessible, as well as playful spaces, to foster and support dialogue, and contribute to events organised by others.

A Continuing Collaboration with Ove Arup Foundation

In 2022, we began a new collaboration with the Ove Arup Foundation on our WEdesign programme, and with their support have continued drive the programme forward to produce a wonderful 2023/24 season. Through WEdesign, we are continuing to develop co-designed and cofacilitated events with higher education partners and students, creating safe places for interdisciplinary and cross-sector conversations about design and placemaking.

WEdesign series 2023/24: People, Place, Planet

This year we worked with our partner universities, students and guest speakers and contributors around the UK to delve into the question of how we can balance our personal needs, the collective needs of our communities and those of our increasingly fragile planet.

Through a series of online and in-person events, the 2023/24 WEdesign series, People, Place, Planet, encouraged participants to identify and explore the opportunities and synergies that exist when we strive to balance people, place and planet in placemaking.

We welcomed participants in person to co-design events in London, Glasgow, Sheffield and Newcastle, all of which were co-designed and co-facilitated with our university partner tutors and students. Online we were joined by participants from across the UK and internationally for our Debate and Chat events, as well as creating a platform for inspiring voices through our series of Think Pieces.

All our events were captured and shared with our networks through blogs written by The GlassHouse team, partners, event participants and participating student facilitators.

We have created a publication that brings together the voices from across the series from all four in-person events alongside our online Debate and Glass-House Chat, and features excerpts from this series’ Think Pieces and blogs capturing the events.

https://theglasshouse.org.uk/resources/people-place-planet-reflections-on-the-2023-24-wedesign-event-series/

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

The Debate

Our 2023/24 WEdesign series kicked off with our opening event, People, Place, Planet: The Debate . We were joined virtually, by around 50 participants from across the UK with varied interests and backgrounds, including diverse professionals and students. Using the theme of People, Place, Planet as our starting point, we invited our three speakers to offer their thoughts and provocations on the theme, through a series of five-minute presentations. This was followed by a stimulating and thought-provoking discussion with generous contributions from the event attendees. The Debate was chaired by The Glass-House Chief Executive, Sophia de Sousa.

The speakers were:

• Doug King – an engineer specialising in urban energy master plans and resource strategies.

Doug’s provocation was that our pattern of living/working, and most of us travelling at the same peak rush hours, is putting pressure on and creating inefficiencies in transport, social and energy infrastructures, even though our city centres are not industrial anymore. He spoke about the efficiency of co-location and places having a mix of residential and commercial properties where people live and work in one location. Could this be the answer to the massive ‘daily tidal flow of humanity washing through our cities’?

• Betty Owoo – a spatial and educational designer currently working with Barking & Dagenham Council.

• Betty focused on giving power to the people, and this power being underpinned by three things: Care, The Right to the City and Commons (or shared resources), all linked together by sustainability. Betty’s suggestion for ‘a cure’ to the sickness of the city references Sherry Arnstein’s Ladder of Participation as a useful framework to discuss participation within the built environment and bringing people into the design process. She shared some inspiring examples of projects which empowered community voices through the design process.

• Holly Doron –an architect based in Dudley, with a background in participatory design and teaching.

Holly championed genuine co-creation and placemaking “not being done to but with”, harnessing people’s skills, experience and creativity, making sure they are valued equally within the process. She also spoke of seeing ourselves as part of nature and connecting & emulating natural processes within our designs and how we live our lives. Her final principal was about the potential of being accountable across time and embracing longterm futures, imaging future collaborations and allowing room in our work for this. Not just seeing our work as stand-alone projects but as transitional and connected, she asked us all to consider, ‘ How will our actions today affect generations in the future?’

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

- Glass House Chat: People, Place, Planet

Our People, Place Planet Chat, a special edition Glass-House Chat, was part of a series of our monthly one-hour sessions, which explore different topical placemaking provocations in a safe, informal online space that invites discussion and debate.

Conversation during the Chat focused on: how people perceive the environment around them; how we design with and for everyone; ownership (real and perceived) of outdoor/public space; the challenges and issues with current funding models; and how we can drive change through current legislation.

People, Place, Planet: Think Pieces

In January, we launched our series of WEdesign Think Pieces, with blogs on the theme of People, Place, Planet added weekly from a range of inspiring voices across sectors and disciplines. This year we increased the number of Think Piece contributors, which has resulted in a collection of provocative, engaging and quite personal blogs from a diverse range of voices.

This included:

• Laura Alvarez, Senior Principal Urban Design and Conservation Officer at Nottingham City Council, explores the meaning of ‘place’ and ‘home’ within the built environment today.

• Grace Crannis, Senior Planning Engagement Officer at Richmond and Wandsworth Councils and Co-director of design studio Syrup, explores the theme through the lens of leadership and accountability in placemaking.

• Stephanie Edwards, architect, urban designer and co-founder of Urban Symbiotics, considers the role of AI in co-designing our future cities.

• Tessa Forde, architect and lecturer at Auckland University of Technology’s Huri Te Ao, explores People, Place Planet through the lens of nourishing and gathering in architecture.

• Nicola Greenan, then lead for Cultural Partnerships at Bradford Council and now CEO at Tyneside Cinema, focuses on the importance of culture for all.

• Hajir Kheder, Community Engagement Manager at Karakusevic Carson Architects, explores the power of social value in harnessing the vitality of communities, neighbourhoods and environment.

• Rebecca Magdin and Michael Howcroft Rebecca Madgin and Michael Howcroft set out some of the key challenges for place-based policy and how Phase Two of the Arts and Humanities Research Council Place Programme seeks to overcome them.

• Susan May, Head of Housing Design at Urban Design Learning, offers some thoughts on how we can better join up the needs of People, Place and our Planet.

• Cam Smith, Impact & Feedback Coordinator at Hastings Commons ,explores the theme of People, Place, Planet through the work of Hastings Commons in the White Rock area of Hastings in East Sussex.

• Zóra Tamás, Community Engagement Officer for Scottish Wildlife Trust’s Nextdoor Nature Programme, explores People, Place, Planet and the concept of ‘outside’.

• Duncan Wilson, Chief Executive at Historic England, considers the theme through the lens of heritage and the power of repurposing.

You can read all these think pieces here: https://theglasshouse.org.uk/tag/people-place-planet-think-pieces/

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

In-person co-design events

WEdesign in-person events are interactive spaces with co-design activities where students, practitioners, policymakers and citizens work together with The Glass-House, and with students and tutors from our partner universities, to explore and co-design propositions to innovate design and placemaking. This year, we were joined by large numbers of students and participants, and convened mixed audiences across sectors, generations, and backgrounds. It was inspiring to see these people working together to co-design propositions for change.

Descriptions of each of the events follow, but here are some of the voices from people who took part, and their key takeaways from the experience:

“To see the young students speak with such passion and articulation of their ideas was wonderful. …There is something refreshing about people 40-50 years apart debating the same ideas and thoughts… it was such a great mix of youth and experience, backgrounds and opinions.”

“Communitarian process produces communitarian responses.”

“…the power of people thinking together and the joy of sharing ideas about better collective futures.”

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Inclusive Crisis Recovery

London, 5 February 2024

With University College London’s Bartlett School of Planning

Our first in-person event, in collaboration with tutors and students from UCL Bartlett’s School of Planning, brought together a fantastic mix of participants to explore how we can be more equitable and inclusive in how we respond to crises, and in our placemaking strategy to mitigate against it.

To get people in the mood as they arrived, we asked them to suggest a way to help bring greater balance to the needs of people, place and our planet. It was clear from the outset that those attending were full of ideas to bring to the evening’s discussion.

Our student facilitators from both undergraduate and postgraduate programmes at the Bartlett, led their packed tables through discussion of the event theme, each using a different lens of community , education , ecology , and practice as a starting point. Following a period of discussion, our tables were tasked with coming up with propositions for change, actionable ideas of how we could do things differently. They then had to build a model to represent and pitch their idea back to the room. Here are the themes that emerged through the discussion that followed:

• The notion of sharing is crucial to the success of achieving balance and equity, whether it be in the more equitable distribution of power, in making information more accessible, or in how we share spaces with the people, plants and creatures around us.

• We need to think systematically about change, and not be afraid to rethink some of the pillars of how we currently do things, be it our planning system, our educational programmes, or how we foster greater collaboration through placemaking.

• Respect, care and empathy should filter through these systems, particularly in creating safe spaces for diverse people and institutions to discuss and work through challenging issues and situations together. It’s okay, and indeed helpful, for people to disagree and to address conflicting views, if there are spaces to do so in a constructive and positive way.

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

The Leisure Society

Sheffield, 28 February 2024

With University of Sheffield’s School of Architecture & Live Works

Our second in-person event was a collaboration with tutors and students from the University of Sheffield’s School of Architecture and Live Works. We brought together students, practitioners, academics and community-based groups and activists to explore the role leisure plays in our daily lives, and how we interact with and shape our places and environments for and through our leisure activities.

As we welcomed our guests into the event, we asked them to start with their personal thoughts on the big picture of how we might better balance people, place and planet. Their ideas included: nature-based solutions that start connecting children with nature; building shared stories about how we belong together; treating people, places, ideas, mistakes and differences with kindness; continually evaluating the balance between people, place and planet, recognising that it is a dynamic system; responding to the planet will naturally create solutions to human problems .

Once we had invited people to take their seats and welcomed them to the evening’s discussion, our partner Leo Care from the Sheffield School of Architecture introduced the theme of The Leisure Society and how it linked to his students’ studies. In particular, Leo stressed that while the ambitions for a leisure society are not new, we are still grappling with clear imbalances, and inequities across gender, socio-economic and cultural divides, and that to many of us, leisure on our terms still feels out of reach.

The conversation that followed was a stimulating space to draw together some of the threads that wove across the various tables’ propositions and provocations. These included the role we can all play in:

• Creating equitable access to leisure, offering diverse shared spaces with no cost attached.

• • Viewing and enabling leisure as a means of connection and exchange with each other and our natural world.

• Deconstructing formalised leisure, defining and doing it on our own terms and for the joy of it (as well as the obvious health and wellbeing benefits)

• Reclaiming our right to leisure – creating more time and space for it and recognising the need for us to claim it as a right, not a luxury

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

The Ethical City

Glasgow, 5 March 2024 With the Glasgow School of Art’s Mackintosh School of Architecture

The Ethical City , in collaboration with Missing in Architecture and students and tutors from the Mackintosh School of Architecture, attracted a large, diverse audience from all walks of life. We explored the role of placemakers in addressing concerns facing the city, such as sustainability, inclusivity, social cohesion and community resources, and how the city facilitates and nurtures society.

As participants started to arrive, they were greeted with a short introductory activity prepared by the students. The task was designed to prompt the participants’ thinking and ground their initial ideas about place in something that was familiar to them before applying their ideas to a global context.

The event showcased that there is a lot to be done, a lot we can do and a lot that’s going on. The principle of co-design, creating democratic space where people’s experience and ideas are valued equally, combined with the events theme The Ethical City. The event acted as a small test bed and forum for revealing people’s priorities for how we transform and care for our spaces. Priorities and threads drawn from across the different groups included:

• The policy and duty to take part, and the need develop and advocate for better participatory processes with diverse voices

• Connection, connection, connection : The importance of connecting with a diversity of voices to foster and nurture ideas, build empathy and support a flourishing Ethical City

• Creating opportunistic moments (both time and spaces) for serendipity and reflection.

• Unearthing the hidden treasures of the city: people, place, space and nature.

As part of the event the students at GSA invited 3 student illustrators to map discussion, capture themes and visually illustrate the conversations which were happening around the room.

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Urban Futures: Sharing Capacity and Resources

Newcastle, 19 March 2024

With Newcastle University’s School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape

Our final WEdesign event of the season, Urban Futures: Sharing Capacity and Resources , brought together another great mix of people to explore how applying the principles of co-housing, sharing resources around shared values and objectives, might help us shape our cities better and more equitably.

When the participants arrived, they were greeted by students who had created several icebreaker activities which participants could interact with. The students were experimenting with different design engagement activities they are developing as part of their studies, and the WEdesign events created a safe space for them to test these methods with our participants.

During the event, each table was facilitated by our students, who guided the participants and discussion through a series of prompt questions with the aim of co-designing propositions for how we might do things differently. At the end of the session the groups pitched their ideas, using models which they had created from simple craft materials which offered a visual representation of their propositions.

With such diversity of voices in the room it was great to see the inspiring ideas which were created in such a short amount of time. There were some interesting threads of conversation which had started to emerge, including:

• The importance of experimentation and being iterative to enable people to challenge the status quo, to develop new ideas and to adapt to our ever-changing environment and society.

• Positive change can happen at varying levels and scales. Sometimes a small physical intervention, such as a community dining table in an open space, or change in behaviour, such as picking up litter, can totally transform an area.

• Access is important and we need to consider and different, less obvious ways and routes into institutions, systems and spaces

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

WEdesign Student Programme

For students, collaboration with The Glass-House through WEdesign creates important opportunities to benefit from interaction with a diverse, cross-sector and interdisciplinary audience. It provides space to further develop their learning and to test and progress their thinking on their live student work.

It is also an opportunity for them to demonstrate what they can contribute to such spaces. Our event participants enjoy connecting with students as facilitators, educators in their own right, and as provocateurs in the placemaking conversations. They enjoy tapping into the students’ growing technical expertise through an exploratory and thematic co-design space, and practitioners and policy-makers in the field are challenged to look at new ways of working and the themes explored through fresh eyes.

To help students step into our event spaces with confidence, and to ensure that their participation in WEdesign contributes to their learning journey, we have created a student programme to support their participation in our events.

Student Sessions

Prior to each event, we worked with our partner tutors and students in a series of introduction and planning sessions, where students discussed the theme, co-created prompt questions and props, and gained an understanding of the basic facilitation tools they needed to use during the event. This year, we did in-person planning sessions with all the students, which helped us both build confidence among the students and build rapport within our facilitation team.

Student Resource

We created a resource booklet for the students which provided a practical guide to the event format, as well as some tips on facilitation.

Student-led Activities

We were pleased to see the students bringing their creativity to both curating the event spaces and facilitation props, and to introducing ice breaker activities into the events. This helped each event take on its own personality, and created additional opportunities for the students to both share their ideas and skills and to build confidence in engaging with the public.

Emerging Partnership Projects

In addition to our key university partnerships, we have also collaborated with The London College of Communications and The Open University to experiment with what we do with the ideas, provocations and data which come from each event. This is just the first step in exploring how we can test and apply the ideas in practice, and we will look to build on this for next year’s season.

Student Voices

We invited students to write blog about their experiences, which were shared on our website, social media and through our networks. Here is an extract from one:

Through this activity, I was deeply inspired by the co-design methodology. In my UCL project, I plan to apply it as a research methodology. This is my biggest gain. In future studies, I may combine the two methodologies of co-design and participatory action research to design places, collide with more ideas, and let the principles of sharing, respect, and exchange run through the design, and jointly create a more sustainable environment.

• Shuqi Miao from UCL Bartlett, shared what she will take from co-facilitating the Inclusive Crisis Recovery event in London.

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Co-creating a Collaborative City for London Festival of Architecture

In June 2023, The Glass-House held an event in collaboration with Bow Church as part of this year’s London Festival of Architecture. We invited families with children and the general public to imagine what a city designed collaboratively will look like, hence the name ‘ Co-Creating a ’ Collaborative City .

Our participants were encouraged to think about what they feel is important in cities, what they want to see more of in the city and what might be missing currently. Prompted by the placement of blank paper on the floor of Bow Church as the cityscape canvas, everyone was invited to creatively co-design their own buildings and city infrastructure using recycled materials and craft supplies. They freely choose what qualities they wanted to portray in the models and the fabric of the city itself. Using cardboard, coloured papers, markers, tissue papers, fuzzy sticks and egg cartons, participants used play to freely express themselves when making the collaborative city.

The Glass-House had discussions with the participants on what they want to put in the city, what qualities should be reflected on their creation, and where to place it. We asked them to consider the size and height, how much light and air the buildings should have, signage and entryways to it, and the materials of the buildings. It helped them identify what their building needed and what was missing from it to make it habitable for the citizens. Participants added windows, doors, greenery, hatching, sketches, textures, and signs to further develop their designs.

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Glass-House Chats

The Glass-House Chats have become a much appreciated part of our public events calendar. These free online sessions were designed to create a safe space to ask questions, explore ideas, approaches and methods, share learning and make connections. They are open to and attract a wide range of participants who are interested in how we can collectively build confidence and capacity in the sectors to engage communities in design and placemaking.

These monthly sessions are chaired by members of The Glass-House team, who briefly introduce the theme and then open the floor for an informal and open discussion among participants. To ensure space for meaningful discussion, places are limited to a small group.

The financial year of 2023/24 crossed over two seasons of Chats:

Glass-House Chats – Season 3

Glass-House Season 3 ran from September 2022 to July 2023. The themes covered in this season included:

• 20 October 2022 – What is Placemaking Now?

• 24 November 2022 – How Can We Use Stories to Change Places?

• 15 December 2022 – Co-design Legacies: What Happens Next?

• 19 January 2023 – How Can We Co-design With Nature?

• 23 February 2023– How Can We Relearn Our Places?

• 23 March 2023– Arts-led Regeneration or Gentrification?

• 20 April 2023– Co-creating Circular Cities

• 18 May 2023– Building Equitable Green Futures

• 15 June 2023– What is A Resilient City?

• 25 July 2023 – GH Chat Roundtable: Resilient Places

We kept these sessions informal, with no set agenda, only a theme as a starting point, and allowed the conversation to go where the mix of participants on the day took us. Every Chat was rich with questions, reflections, ideas and above all, with sharing.

The key themes that emerged from the Chats, along with a participants’ perspective on the taking part, were captured, in blogs which were then compiled in a series publication.

https://theglasshouse.org.uk/resources/glass-house-chats-bringingsectors-together-2022-2023/

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Glass-House Chats – Season 4

Glass-House Season 4 runs from October 2023 to June 2024. The themes covered in this season include:

• 17 October 2022 – Housing or Homes?

• 14 November 2022 – Growing Places?

• 12 December 2022 – Careful Construction

• 23 January 2023 – Spaces for Culture

• 12 March 2023 – People, Place, Planet

• 30 April 2023 – Has Public Transport Hit the Buffers?

• 28 May 2023 – Wellbeing & Placemaking

• 25 June 2023 – The Right to Shape Places

Like last year, our Chats crossed over with our WEdesign event series, with a special WEdesign Chat in February. This created a different kind of space for people to explore the event series theme, Relearning Place , and help connect audiences from the two series.

Our Design Champions on Podcasts

Architecture for Kids podcast

Elly spoke about engaging children and young people, and The Glass-House approach to this, on this Architecture for Kids podcast.

Climate Salon podcast

In late December, Jake joined a small panel of guests on Dezeen’s Climate Salon podcast on the theme of Designing Resilient Communities. Listen to the podcast here

Contributing to Journals

In January, our Chief Executive Sophia contributed a think piece to the Academy of Urbanism’s Journal, Here & Now . In the piece, she explores the delicate balance of using in-personal and digital spaces to bring people together to explore design and placemaking.

You can read the piece and access the Here & Now journal here: https://hubble-live-assets.s3.euwest-1.amazonaws.com/aou/file_asset/file/3272/AoU_Here___Now_Winter_2024.pdf#page=25

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Other events to inform, provoke discussion and inspire

The Glass-House has an approach to developing and participating in events that engage audiences in thinking, exploring and doing. We have embedded this interactive approach and created spaces to inform and inspire at the following events organised by others:

• AAE 2023 Productive Disruptive, Association of Architectural Education, July 2023

• Community Action in Action, Camden Collective, October 2023

• Wider Issues, Manchester School of Architecture, Dec 2023

External events attended included:

• Designing for Circular Economies , RIBA, April 2023

• Fair Exchange: Six principles for equitable placemaking , Public Practice, May 2023

• Designing the future of UK-China RD&I collaboration in the museums and galleries sector , Brunel University, August 2023

• ICE Publishing Awards , Institution of Civil Engineers, October 2023

• DLUHC Roundtable Session - Updating National Model Design Code Part 1 , Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities, November 2023

• Erde , Jo Gibbons & Kate Blee with tHEIR Gallery

• TET Awards , December 2023

• National Park City Pop-up Launch , January 2024

• Book Launch for Essential Urbanism and A Beginner’s Guide to Urban Design and Development , Urban Design Group, March 2024

Supporting dialogue through our website & social media

We see our website and social media as a space to share our work and learning, inspiring stories and best practice, and to provoke discussion and debate.

This year, we created a publication of the series of blogs on Engaging Communities in Design Decision Making drew together our experience in supporting communities to play an active role in the design journey, with a series of pieces aimed at helping others create their own engaged and empowering design processes.

You can read the publication here:

https://theglasshouse.org.uk/resources/engaging-communities-in-designdecision-making-publication/

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Action Research

The Glass-House has become a respected voice in the field of research on design processes that empower people in and through placemaking. Our action research is rooted in working collaboratively across sectors and both with and within communities to co-design projects that develop new knowledge methodologies and practical resources.

An ongoing strategic partnership with the Open University

Since 2013, The Glass-House has had a strategic partnership with the Open University’s Design Group. Our partnership innovates, supports and promotes community-led, participatory and codesign practice and research for the benefit of better places for all.

Our partnership is committed to working collaboratively to this shared mission both within and outside funded projects, and we continuously develop new material to use, evolve and share the approaches and methods we develop. This year saw us do this in relation to two collaborative research projects.

Cross-pollination: Growing cross-sector design collaboration in placemaking

(Jan 2022-April 2023)

In April, we completed our research project Cross-pollination: Growing cross-sector design collaboration in placemaking. This knowledge exchange project in partnership with The Open University took our asset-based cross-pollination approach into communities in England, Scotland and Wales, aiming to help empower organisations and networks to work together to shape their local places. The project was funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council under their Place Programme.

Cross-pollination brings people together to identify shared goals and objectives, identify and connect local projects and initiatives, and work together to unearth and mobilise local assets (skills, networks, physical spaces, tools and resources, funding pots etc.) as a basis for forming partnerships and collaborations. The approach aims to break down barriers between those working in the community and voluntary sector, local businesses and/or local government, and to create a space where all ideas and assets, and projects of different size and focus are brought together and valued equally. In simple terms, the approach explores how you can bring your projects, initiatives and assets together through collaboration to make what you do together more powerful and effective than what you could do separately.

Cross-Pollination Resource Pack and Kits

• • https://theglasshouse.org.uk/resources/cross pollination resource/

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

In January of 2023, we had launched our open-source Cross-pollination Resource Pack which includes: information on the background of the approach, values and principles of the approach; case studies of how it has been used in different contexts; practical guidance on the key stages of cross-pollination; a flexible model for a cross-pollination workshop, and printable props to use in the workshop.

We were pleased to use this, and hand over a “cross-pollination kit”, to two communities beyond the confines of the funded project. These are described in the Improving Places section below.

- Sharing a range of films on cross pollination

The Cross-pollination project also produced a series of films by filmmaker Emma Crouch of i say RAAR, capturing different groups’ experience of using the cross-pollination approach, and an explainer video which illustrates the various stages of a cross-pollination workshop.

• Method Film , intended to work alongside the Cross-pollination Resource Pack, serves as a demonstration of the workshop process in four simple steps – here.

• Showcase Film: Merthyr, Tydil, London and Edinburgh , captures and collates voices and perspectives across the cross-pollination project locations – here.

• The Journey from Portobello to Liberton & Gilmerton, Edinburgh , illustrates the crosspollination approach through capturing our workshop in Liberton & Gilmerton with EVOC and draws out connections with a previous workshop in Portobello in 2019 – here.

• LPNC Rangers Workshop Film, capturing our workshop in Feb 2023 with London National Park City – here.

• Merthyr Tydfil Film, capturing the Welsh arm of the project – here.

The full collection of films is available here: https://theglasshouse.org.uk/resources/cross-pollination-films- landing page/

Co-design Method Films

One of the wonderful benefits of our strategic partnership with the Design Group at The Open University is that our collaboration spans a number of research projects and other joint initiatives, and that we are able to develop and evolve ideas, tools and methods over time.

This year, we were pleased to share a series of short, animated films that we have developed with our Open University colleagues, which we hope will give others the confidence to embrace and use co-design in their work as we have in ours.

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

A Brief Introduction to Co-design

This animation introduces the concept of co-design: what it is, why it is needed and what role professional designers can play in making it happen.

You can watch this film here https://theglasshouse.org.uk/a-brief-intro-to-co-design/

Method Films

We have also created two short animations to introduce two methods we use to support co-design, which were developed through research collaborations with The Open University.

Developing a Shared Design Purpose

This animation introduces a structured way to facilitate the creation of a shared purpose among participants in a co-design project

Connecting Challenges, Assets and Opportunities

This animation introduces a technique for generating ideas for design by unearthing and combining individual and collective challenges and assets to create opportunities.

You can watch these method films here: https://theglasshouse.org.uk/co-design-method-films/

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Activating Knowledge Exchange through the TAP Internship Programme

For the second year, we worked alongside two interns from The University of Sheffield who were enrolled on an internship programme called TAP (Transforming and Activating Places). TAP aims to partner students with organisations and businesses across the UK that focus on place and/or placemaking. The student programme, funded by Research England and the Office for

Students aims to facilitate mutually beneficial internships between University of Sheffield students and organisations already involved in transforming and activating places.

The TAP internships create professional development opportunities for under-represented groups and encourage students from a broad range of disciplines to apply their studies and life skills in the context of placemaking. We were pleased to invite students from TAP into our work as we think this programme is creating an important space for collaboration.

An important part of The Glass-House practice is introducing students to our work and approach, to help them explore more engaged design and placemaking in safe spaces where they can learn, experiment and be nurtured. We also know that students have a lot to offer us, bringing creativity, skills and different experiences into our mix.

We decided to build on last year’s work with our TAP interns, and to use this space to further develop The Glass-House workshop model Empowering Children through Design in Gaming using the online gaming platform Roblox, and in particular Roblox Studio.

With this in mind, we moved between big picture ideation and more focused research to contemplate how old and new aspects of the gaming workshop model could be nuanced for different scenarios.

Through this we identified four key innovations we wanted to test and explore:

• Understanding the challenges and opportunities of working with schools, supporting them delivering the model and inviting children into a space of design enabling.

• Working with a design practice to embed the gaming workshop model within placemaking design professions.

• Inviting parents to co-design on Roblox Studio (which differed from State of Play workshop with NVM).

• Exploring how we can create a prototype resource that enables others to step into the Gaming Workshop and deliver an iteration of the model.

Exploring different Contexts

In order to test these various iterations, our interns Sam and Piotr helped us consider how others might use the model to empower young people in design of place and placemaking within different spheres. To explore this further, we worked with a couple of primary schools in Sheffield, running a focus group session with a small group of teachers to explore how we could introduce the workshop model into schools.

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The State of Play Workshop with Karakusevic Carson Architects (KCA) This was also the first time we had tested delivering the gaming workshop at the premises of an architecture practice. This helped us introduce participants to real world applications of designing and building within a placemaking profession, exploring similarities between the gaming software and those used by professionals.

We returned to our partners Karacusevic Carson Architects, with whom we had collaborated on our gaming workshop at The Willows on Broadwater Primary School, within the context of neighbourhood regeneration. Through this new collaboration with KCA and the TAP programme, we were able to offer the workshop for free to local families. Using a variation of The State of Play workshop, we hosted a group of young children aged 9 – 11 and their accompanying parents and guardians at KCA’s office in central London.

The workshop was iterated with our two interns Sam and Piotr, who delivered a portion of the session exploring the design and diversity of landscapes we can play with, in and on, highlighting various considerations for the young people and parents to think about in their own design. We

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also invited the parents to design and build in Roblox Studio alongside their children by providing them with their own laptop. This differed from the previous State of Play workshop where only the children were given a laptop each.

Working with Karakusevic Carson Architects, we wanted to highlight and reflect the real-world applications of the skills that the children have already, and that they are gaining through the workshop.

As part of the workshop, KCA introduced a typical design journey that architectural designers might take, from concept sketches to models and visual renders. Using examples of projects they had worked on, KCA spoke about the different design decisions they had made and why they had made them.

Our last stage of work with Sam and Piotr, after testing and reflecting on the workshop model with and for new contexts, was to explore how we could enable others to use the model, on their own terms, to empower and invite young people into the design of places and placemaking. We considered what a practical resource might include to support others delivering the gaming workshop model.

State of Play publication

We were keen to capture our experience and learning from The State of Play workshop and have produced a publication which sets out the journey through the day’s activities, captures the wonderful creations of the participating children and their guardians, and reflects on what we learned through this iteration of our gaming workshop model.

https://theglasshouse.org.uk/resources/state-of-play-workshoppublication/

TAP Symposium

Our final collaboration with our interns was co-presenting at the TAP Symposium 2023 . The Symposium brought together and celebrated the many collaborations and a wide range of initiatives supported and delivered through TAP, their students and the many participating partners.

Celebrating our Gaming Workshop Model at the TET Awards

We were also pleased for our work on the Design Gaming Workshop Model to be shortlisted for this year’s TET , in the Online / IT Projects & Materials/Resources category.

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Innovating Practice

More engaged and inclusive design is becoming more and more central to the narrative around placemaking. There is no doubt that things have changed quite significantly in this space over the past two decades, and The Glass-House has been a driving force in championing and enabling this. However, despite more interest and intent across sectors, there is still a huge skills gap within the public and private sectors and lack of shared understanding regarding what it means to move from consultation to true empowerment and meaningful involvement in decision-making.

As a key champion and enabler in this field for over two decades, The Glass-House sees the space of innovating, sharing learning and helping others to do what we do as a key part of our work. Here is a snapshot of some key work in helping to inform, inspire and innovate practice:

This Must Be the Place, Ebbsfleet

Over the summer, The Glass-House collaborated with arts organisation Cement Fields to deliver a workshop with young people exploring design engagement (described in the Improving Place Section) and to host a webinar with speakers from across the industry to explore youth-led design, as part of their This Must Be the Place programme.

Young People Making Places Webinar

On Thursday 20 July, we held the Young People Making Places webinar in collaboration with Cement Fields and the Ebbsfleet Design Group. The evening event brought together a range of inspiring voices from across placemaking, built environment design and community landscapes for an online conversation exploring how we can make more room for youth-led design.

You can watch the webinar here: - - - - https://theglasshouse.org.uk/resources/young people making places webinar/

Our first segment welcomed Aleyna, Precious and Harvey, young people from the Ebbsfleet Design Group. They reflected on their experience in Ebbsfleet, discussing how they got involved in the group and what attracted them to be part of the engagement and design journey. They spoke about their favourite elements of the programme to date and reflected on why it’s so important to include young people in design conversations.

• We then heard from speakers who were all practicing professionals working with young people. Larry Botchway, who is an architect and co-founder of POoR Collective. POoR (Power Out of Restriction) is a socially-minded organisation that focuses on the development of communities through the elevation of young people.

• Anna Francis, one of the co-directors of The Portland Inn Project, an arts and communityled organisation established to address inequalities of access to social, cultural and sporting activities for people in their local area in Stoke-on-Trent.

• Sahra Hersi, who is an artist, spatial designer and educator working across London, shared her work, which draws on her ethos of participation and care, working with local people and stakeholders to understand how designs should be developed and co-produced.

• Huan Rimington, founding director of Build Up, which is a London-based charity running practical construction projects with young people aged 10 – 23.

All our speakers stressed the importance of actively listening to children and young people, and providing the flexibility within project journeys to be responsive to ideas and thoughts that emerge from working with young people.

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Supporting Practice through CPD

We continue to work with design practices, eager to inject confidence and skills around design engagement into their staff teams. Indeed, this year, this took us outside the UK to deliver a workshop for practitioners for design and development professionals from several practices in Dublin.

In January we were pleased to do a full-day workshop on design engagement with the London Borough of Haringey. We welcomed staff from the Regeneration, Parks and other teams, and spent the day exploring approaches, strategies and practical tools to work collaboratively with diverse stakeholders and user groups through design and placemaking.

Supporting Higher Education

The Glass-House enjoys working with universities and where possible, we inject some of our experience and learning into degree programmes for emerging design and regeneration professionals. This year, we continued to build on our WEdesign programme (as described in the Supporting Dialogue section), and supported a number of universities with a range of activities.

These included: working with the Design Group at The Open University to offer an online “designathon”; delivering a workshop on engagement for UCL Bartlett School of Planning; our Design Champion Jake talking about the “Wider Issues” in architecture at the Manchester School of Architecture; and our Chief Executive Sophia sitting as an External Examiner on the University of Sheffield’s MA in Urban Design and Newcastle University’s BA in Architecture and Urban Planning.

The Glass-House on Panels and Advisory Groups

The Engagement Overlay for the RIBA Plan of Work

The Glass-House team was pleased to contribute to the development of the Engagement Overlay to the RIBA Plan of Work , a collaboration between the Royal Institute of British Architects, the Association of Collaborative Design, Sustrans and over 30 contributing organisations.

“The main objective of the Engagement Overlay is to provide a standardised approach and baseline for architects and other built environment professionals to enhance the quality of engagement with all stakeholders and to create capacity for public participation beyond traditional methods of solely informing and consulting. It aims to provide the mechanisms and structure for facilitating early, effective and proportionate engagement throughout all work stages while adhering to the existing RIBA Plan of Work framework.” ~~TS~~ From RIBA websitelanding-page/engagement ~~OO~~ https://www.architecture.com/knowledge-overlay-to-riba-plan-of-work -and-resources/resources-

The Design Code Pathfinders Programme Expert Panel

As part of the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill, Local Planning Authorities have a duty to produce Design Codes. The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) wanted to provide all local authorities across England with the necessary skills and resources to do this confidently. Following an initial pilot, 25 local authorities and neighbourhood groups were selected to participate in a national Pathfinder programme for design coding.

Chief Executive Sophia sat on the Design Code Pathfinders Programme Expert Panel, convened by Design Council, which worked with DLUHC to support the Pathfinder teams. This meant working

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with both local authorities and neighbourhood planning groups as a critical friend at key strategic points in their journey.

A session that Sophia did for the Design Code Pathfinder groups through a series of workshops organised by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) has now been integrated into Pathfinder Insight Guidance on Community Engagement produced by the Design Council.

You can read the document here: - ~~T~~ https://issuu.com/designcouncil/docs/design_code_pathfinder_programme_ ~~e~~ _conversations_a/18

Community Engagement Code of Practice Development with the Quality of Life Foundation

Our Design Champion Elly also sat on a working group led by the Quality of Life Foundation to develop a code of conduct for community consultation and engagement in planning and the built environment, as part of their major research project funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council. Sophia then reviewed the emergent Code of Practice they produced as a critical friend, making a series of recommendations.

You can read the document here: https://www.qolf.org/code-of-practice/

High Streets Task Force Expert Panel

Sophia sits on this register of Experts, Mentors and Facilitators, which was a recommendation of the High Street 2030 Review, which called for additional capacity to support local authorities in transforming their high streets. Experts, Mentors and Facilitators support high streets directly by providing a range of support services that form part of the wider Task Force programme.

Historic England Advisory Committee

Sophia also sits on the Historic England Advisory Committee, which offers expert advice to staff and the Commission on Historic England's functions under the National Heritage Act 1983, and other relevant legislation, in particular, on policy matters and casework (excluding London) where it is novel, contentious or sets a precedent.

Awards

This year we were finalists in two categories for the Thornton Education Trust’s Inspire Future Generation Awards. Our WEdesign Programme was shortlisted in the Mentoring category and our Design Gaming Workshop Model in the Online / IT Projects & Materials/Resources category.

We were also pleased to see This Must Be the Place, to which we contributed, win in two categories.

Two projects to which we contributed were also celebrated in the NLA awards:

• Broadwater Farm Estate, winner in the category of Masterplan and Area Strategies - read about it here (read about The Glass-House involvement here)

• ExploreStation, shortlisted in the category of Transport and Infrastructure category - read about it here (read about The Glass-House involvement here)

We were also at the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) Annual Publishing Awards, celebrating with co-authors of the paper Co-creating social value in placemaking: the grand balancing act which was awarded the Richard Trevithick Fund Prize.

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Improving Places

Our approach to supporting projects has always been rooted in helping people to develop the skills, tools and confidence to lead their local project and to connect with potential partners and beneficiaries. Our enabling and empowerment model aims to support better collaboration and more sustainable approaches to transforming places and spaces. We respond to communities, local authorities, housing associations, developers and design teams that approach us for support.

Working with Young People from the Ebbsfleet Design Group

In June, The Glass-House team travelled along the Thames Estuary to deliver an afternoon workshop with Ebbsfleet Design Group, a group of young people from Ebbsfleet and its surrounding neighbourhoods. The group, part of Cement Fields’ This Must be The Place long-term placemaking project in Ebbsfleet, is exploring and shaping the new garden city as it is being built through a range of projects and workshops.

We worked with the young people to unpack ideas around the design of places, what design engagement is and why it is so important when thinking about how we shape current and future spaces and places. The majority of the session was dedicated to the young people designing engagement activities to inform a future building in Ebbsfleet for other children, teenagers and young adults. We asked them to reflect on their own experience of being in the design group, considering why and how they would want to be engaged to then inform their own designs.

The young people split into two groups for this fast co-design activity. The first group considered how music can attract and bring people into spaces, designing a long tunnel structure that played music and contained strings of attractive lights. The space also included benches to create places to rest and linger within the tunnel. Young people who were drawn by the structure would then be asked their opinion on various aspects of the future design of the building.

The second group reflected on why they were interested in being part of the Ebbsfleet Design Group, thinking about the opportunities, meeting new people and learning new skills. Lots of their friends are interested in going into the construction industry after finishing school, so they designed an engagement activity that involved building parts of the new building. The activity would introduce young people to new, green building methods and technologies whilst getting them involved in co-creating the building.

We were pleased to work with this group again as several of them joined us for our webinar in collaboration with Cement Fields, Young People Making Places (detailed in the supporting Dialogue section).

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Nextdoor Nature with Scottish Wildlife Trust

In December, we facilitated a workshop for the Scottish Wildlife Trust, as part of their Pioneers Programme training for their Nextdoor Nature project.

This extract from a blog about the Nextdoor Nature programme and the workshop written by Gillian Hatcher, Engagement Manager, and Zóra Tamás, Nextdoor Nature Community Engagement Officer at The Scottish Wildlife Trust, helps set the context.

Funded by National Lottery players, the 2-year Nextdoor Nature project includes the development and delivery of our exciting new Pioneers Programme . This six-month training programme is completely free and open to community leaders (established and aspiring) from lower income communities that have not always been given the support they deserve from larger nature conservation organisations. The course covers a wide range of topics around how to improve local spaces for nature, but also about how to effectively organise for change in your community, which is why we were keen to get The Glass-House involved.

As part of the programme the ‘pioneers’ are supported to carry out a small community project, with many focussing on taking ownership of poorly used public spaces, or collectively enhancing an existing greenspace for the benefit of both people and wildlife. Pioneers planting trees.

The workshop consisted of three key aspects:

1. Introducing community-led design, design engagement and some of the strategies, tools and methos to support more grass-roots and inclusive design processes. This included a focus on mapping (communities, challenges and opportunities, assets, etc) and the power of playful engagement activities. We also shared some inspiring examples of community-led open space projects.

2. Using activity cards we had produced, the Nextdoor Nature pioneers practiced describing themselves and their projects using just a few sentences. While sharing their ideas and skills, pioneers could also see potential connections, such as shared interests and skills that can help others.

3. Working together to co-design an engagement strategy for a fictional community garden. This helped participants explore how to activate local conversations and collaborations to both inform and resource projects.

Reconnecting with Quaggy Waterways Action Group

We were hugely inspired by the many and varied projects being explored and activated by these Nextdoor Nature community champions to activate underused green spaces in their areas. Participants were also inspired by some of the stories we shared about groups we had encountered over the years and asked us to share one of these on their blog. Sophia wrote an Inspired blog about the Quaggy Waterways Action Group, which she had visited for the BURA Regeneration Awards back in 2007. This proved a great opportunity to reconnect with QWAG, who have gone from strength to strength and remain an inspiring example of both community-led and cross-sector collaborative placemaking.

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The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Supporting Place-based Dialogue with cross-pollination

We were pleased to be able to use the cross-pollination approach, and the resources we had created through the Cross-pollination research project to support locally based organisations convene local conversations to address local issues and to kick-start collaborations.

Activating Cross-sector Collaboration in Holborn

In October, we teamed up with The Open University and Holborn Community Association (HCA) to run a cross-pollination workshop to help spark cross-sector dialogue and collaboration around placemaking in the area. Holborn Community Association Paul Crozier described the motivation and impact of the workshop in a blog, which

Here is an extract:

The idea behind this event, the reason we brought it together, was negative, soured relationships across our area, particularly between the resident community and others involved in planning, developing or construction across the area. Our community is based in central London – it’s busy, built up, densely packed and there’s a lot of development. There’s also a large resident population (over 20,000 people). Like lots of London, there’s inequality, pockets of deprivation and … The two groups don’t always sit well together. HCA saw the frustrations, the sense of powerlessness but also the opportunities and, crucially, the people and communities behind development as well. Cue lots of work to try and bring people back together and see what would happen from there.

The day brought together “…people from across the community, healthy representation from some large local organisations with a big footprint in the area, planners, developers and colleagues from other voluntary and community groups. Using the format and tools of the cross pollination box helped everyone in that room step back, understand what the place around us really meant for one another and how we might all help make things better. The space for conversation allowed people to explore and learn from each other. It was a powerful day.

…There’s been lots of follow up on different things – but consistent throughout has been feedback about how refreshing it was, how useful it was and how positive people are feeling about ways forward. I/we confess to being a little bit amazed ourselves that people (and organisations) are so surprised by the power of talking to each other.

You can read Paul’s piece in full here.

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Chichester Community Development Trust

In November, we teamed up with our Open University Colleagues again to visit the Chichester Community Development Trust (CCDT) where we did another cross-pollination workshop to help activate cross-sector collaboration across the district . Claire Robinson, Head of Partnerships at CCDT, reflected on the day in a blog she wrote for The Glass-House. Here is an excerpt:

The participants included representatives from Chichester District and City Council, West Sussex County Council, Chichester Festival Theatre, Pathfinder, residentsresidents’ associations, social prescribers, Chichester College and University, Stonepillow, the foodbank and many more vital community organisations. The magic happens when all those participating share not only their assets and aspirations, but their needs and what they can offer others.

In a fast-paced process of discussion and ideas generation the event began with an opportunity to learn more about the other individuals in this critical community-led collaboration; to share knowledge of spaces, people, projects and places that were known to bring support to those in need; and then to project each individual and their organisations goals and hurdles. More specifically each participant listed out the projects they were currently working on; the projects they would like to do; and finally the skills, space or anything else they could contribute to others.

Those involved were asked if such a collaborative event would be worthwhile on a regular basis and a majority felt the value of such meetings could only enhance our collective delivery. Future workshops are therefore to be scheduled on a quarterly basis.

You can read Claire’s piece in full here.

We are delighted to report that CCDT have created a digital map of the projects and assets discussed and are continuing to use this approach to support local conversations. In autumn 2024, will be working with us to trial Community WEdesign, which will see community-based organisations using our WEdesign event model to host co-design sprints to address local issues.

Chichester Community Development Trust Championing Great Design

CCDT also treated us to a visit around their various assets and inspired us with their great work to safeguard and regenerate buildings and spaces for the benefit of local communities across the whole of the Chichester District. We were delighted to hear from them that attending The GlassHouse Buildings by Design training course back in 2017, and that working with our team and Glass-House Enablers, had had a clear impact on their design journey.

Read about the Building by Design course, delivered as part of our Empowering Design Practices research project, here

Read Sophia’s blog about Great Design at CCDT.

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Business development and financial review of 2023/24

2023/24 was another busy and productive year for The Glass-House, with a mix of income through core funding, research funding, project grant funding, and commissioned services. As the preceding pages have demonstrated, our mix of income has allowed us to offer a diverse programme of activities, while also taking important steps towards making the organisation more robust and improving internal systems and infrastructure.

At the close of 2023/24 we find ourselves in a strong position for 2024/25, with total funds at £103.4k. This is thanks to ongoing funding from The Glass-House Trust and continuing support from the Ove Arup Foundation. However, we do have some clear targets in place for the coming year, as two key decisions taken this year have had an impact on our bottom line and our reserves position.

The first strategic decision taken this year was regarding our continued investment in our staffing. In summer 2023, our Chief Executive was obliged to take a period of medical leave for orthopaedic surgery, and both she and the Board were keen to maintain a solid core staff team in place for this period, using significant reserves to extend staff contracts that had been due to end. This proved to be a sensible decision, as the team was able to continue the work of the organisation without any impact to the various programmes during the Chief Executive’s absence.

The second aspect relates to research funding, and to strategic development. For the first time in many years, we did not have significant income in 2023/24 through research funding, as we were consolidating past projects and working with strategic partners to develop a range of projects for 2024/25 and beyond. Through this work, we have further developed our strategic partnership with The Open University, now linking our partnership with their Open Societal Challenges programme, and with several projects of varying scales now in development and in discussion with funders. We expect some of these projects to begin in the autumn 2024 and spring 2025.

With the support of The Glass-House Trust, we have also continued our collaboration with an archivist to help us consolidate several print and digital datasets (which include text, photographs, video and audio recordings) into one searchable system that will serve both as the organisation’s live workspace and as a digital archive. As well as supporting the day-to-day working practice of the organisation, this process to consolidate our data and systems is a crucial step towards our goal of creating an open-source online resource hub or “living archive”. This will serve as a resource to both communities and professionals engaging in participatory design processes, as well as to students and academia. The Trust has since agreed a further grant to help us continue this work.

Looking forward

We embark on 2024/25 taking note of the socio-political and financial upheaval of the past year, and the inevitable impact that a change of government will have. Many of our commissioning clients, particularly local authorities, have had to pause or cancel projects, which has had a knockon effect on our immediate pipeline of commissioned work, but we are investing in developing larger scale research and infrastructure projects with our strategic partner The Open University and a growing network of other partners keen to get involved.

We can see clear momentum and progress in the development of these ambitious, multi-year projects, but must also be mindful that such projects will require patience and negotiation over several months to secure the significant investment we are seeking. To help maintain momentum, we expect to also deliver some smaller projects which will help us develop the projects and partnerships and create opportunities for shorter-term impact both for our organisation and the partners and communities with which we work.

32

The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

We will continue to explore how we can best work with others to support a cross-sector and interdisciplinary network, our “collaborative economy”, of those supporting community leadership in design and placemaking. This will be crucial to addressing the changing landscape around us and to ensuring that we can continue to provide free support to communities and to work with and innovate practice, policy and education to help empower communities in design and placemaking.

We will continue to work in collaboration with several higher education partners to support the integration of our learning and experience into degree courses, and to support new champions heading into practice. We will also continue to work with students and communities involved in live projects, mentoring students working with their locally based groups in their area, and helping to draw students and communities onto our event series and the national dialogue around design and placemaking

We will continue to provide both engaging public events and practical support on the ground, and to use our experience and learning to champion and enable best policy and practice, and increasingly to educate and empower others to do what we do. The coming year will see us continuing to develop a wide range of resources to support communities and professionals to help connect design, people, and place, and to build capacity to support community-led and participatory design processes.

It is our aim to continue to play an active and outspoken role in the field of design and placemaking, and to champion the role of community leadership in shaping where we live, work and play.

Reserves policy

Our reserves policy, for the purposes of ensuring the robustness of the organisation, is based on three months’ fixed running costs and is currently calculated at £42k based on our current budget and forecasts for the coming year.

The desired figure for reserves of £42k compares with our existing general unrestricted funds of approximately £35k and restricted funds of £66k. In calculating the free reserves, the Directors have excluded the designated fund that represents the net book value of the fixed assets.

The Glass-House Trust will continue to fund the organisation at the current level of support (£100k per annum), which, combined with other secured funding, provides a high degree of security and the financial viability of the organisation through March 2026. We expect a further 3-year cycle of funding through March 2029 given satisfactory reporting and given that the organisation remains active and viable.

The Ove Arup Foundation is contributing £60k per annum over three years, with a current commitment through 2025.

While we did use significant reserves in 2023/24 and have built some risk into the 2024/25 budget, we are confident that our reserves and commitment from The Glass-House Trust and the Ove Arup Foundation places us in a secure financial position in the short term. We are also confident that new income streams will emerge from the various projects in development.

Our reserves policy will be reviewed again in the new year, once we have a better idea of which projects will be funded and going ahead, and we have a better understanding of the impact that this will have on our budget and staffing. Our objective is to rebuild our reserves as quickly as possible to ensure that we are able to respond to any new opportunities or challenges both to the sector and to our organisation and to ensure resilience and the ability to respond to opportunity and crisis effectively in the longer term.

33

The Glass-House Community Led Design Directors’ report For the year ended 31 March 2024

Preparation of the report

This report of the Directors has been prepared taking advantage of the small companies exemption of section 415A of the Companies Act 2006.

This report was approved and authorised for issue by the Directors on 14 October 2024 and signed on its behalf by:

Prue Chiles Chair

34

Independent examiner’s report To the members of The Glass-House Community Led Design

I report to the trustees on my examination of the accounts of The Glass-House Community Led Design for the year ended 31 March 2024.

This report is made solely to the trustees as a body, in accordance with the Charities Act 2011. My examination has been undertaken so that I might state to the trustees those matters I am required to state to them in an independent examiner's report and for no other purpose. To the fullest extent permitted by law, I do not accept or assume responsibility to anyone other than the charity and the trustees as a body, for my examination, for this report, or for the opinions I have formed.

Responsibilities and basis of report

As the charity trustees of the Company you are responsible for the preparation of the accounts in accordance with the requirements of the Charities Act 2011 (‘the Act’) and the Companies Act 2006 (‘the 2006 Act’) .

Having satisfied myself that the accounts of the Company are not required to be audited under Part 16 of the 2006 Act and are eligible for independent examination, I report in respect of my examination of the Company’s accounts carried out under section 145 of the 2011 Act and in carrying out my examination I have followed all the applicable Directions given by the Charity Commission under section 145(5)(b) of the Charities Act 2011 (‘the 2011 Act’).

Independent examiner’s statement

I have completed my examination. I confirm that no material matters have come to my attention in connection with the examination giving me cause to believe that in any material respect:

• Accounting records were not kept in respect of the Company as required by section 386 of the 2006 Act; or

The accounts do not accord with those records; or

1. The accounts do not comply with the accounting requirements of section 396 of the 2006 Act other than any requirement that the accounts give a ‘true and fair view’ which is not a matter considered as part of an independent examination; or

The accounts have not been prepared in accordance with the methods and principles of the Statement of Recommended Practice for accounting and reporting by charities;

35

Independent examiner’s report

To the members of

The Glass-House Community Led Design

I have no concerns and have come across no other matters in connection with the examination to which attention should be drawn in this report in order to enable a proper understanding of the accounts to be reached.

Name: Noelia Serrano FCA DChA Address: Sayer Vincent LLP,110 Golden Lane, London, EC1Y 0TG

23 October 2024

36

The Glass-House Community Led Design

Statement of financial activities (incorporating an income and expenditure account)

For the year ended 31 March 2024

Note Income from: 2 3 3 3 3 4 4 4 4 5 Reconciliation of funds: Total funds carried forward Action Research Supporting Dialogue Innovating Practice Total expenditure Net expenditure for the year and net movement in funds Total funds brought forward Improving Places Total income Expenditure on: Charitable activities Supporting Dialogue Innovating Practice Investments - Bank interest Donations and legacies Charitable activities Improving Places Action Research	Unrestricted funds Total £ 100,000 7,095 2,141 - 8,676 1,533 119,445 47,535 53,149 1,245 51,670 153,599 (34,154) 71,813 37,659	Restricted Funds Total £ - - - 60,000 - - 60,000 - 10,080 67,824 - 77,904 (17,904) 83,679 65,775	2024 Total £ 100,000 7,095 2,141 60,000 8,676 1,533 179,445 47,535 63,229 69,069 51,670 231,503 (52,058) 155,492 103,434	2023 Total £ 100,000 12,743 52,965 60,477 42,799 263
				269,247
				44,422 78,394 62,656 53,005
				238,477
				30,770 124,722
				155,492

The Statement of Financial Activities contains all gains and losses for the year. Activities included under unrestricted funds relate to continuing operations. Movements in funds are disclosed in Note 14 to the financial statements.

37

The Glass-House Community Led Design

Company no. 5435630

Balance sheet

As at 31 March 2024

Note Fixed assets: 10 Current assets: 11 Liabilities: 12 13 Restricted income funds Total unrestricted funds General funds Total charity funds The funds of the charity: Unrestricted income funds: Designated funds Total net assets Net current assets Cash at bank and in hand Creditors: amounts falling due within one year Debtors Tangible assets	£ 62,650 49,352	2024 £ 2,223	£ 14,311 151,901	2023 £ 4,033
		101,211		151,459
	112,002 (10,791)		166,212 (14,753)
	2,223 35,436		4,033 67,780
		103,434		155,492
		65,775 37,659		83,679 71,813
		103,434		155,492

The opinion of the directors is that the company is entitled to the exemptions conferred by Section 477 of the Companies Act 2006 relating to small companies.

The directors acknowledge the following responsibilities:

• (i) The members have not required the company to obtain an audit of its accounts for the year in question in accordance with section 476,

• (ii) The directors acknowledge their responsibilities for complying with the requirements of the Act with respect to accounting records and the preparation of accounts.

These accounts have been prepared in accordance with the provisions applicable to companies subject to the small companies’ regime.

Approved by the directors on 14 October 2024 and signed on their behalf by

Prue Chiles Chair

38

The Glass-House Community Led Design

Notes to the financial statements

For the year ended 31 March 2024

1 Accounting policies

a) Statutory information

• The Glass-House Community Led Design is a charitable company limited by guarantee and is incorporated in the United Kingdom. The registered office address is Mainyard Studios, 35 Bow Road, London E3 2AD.

b) Basis of preparation

The financial statements have been prepared in accordance with Accounting and Reporting by Charities: Statement of Recommended Practice applicable to charities preparing their accounts in accordance with the Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the UK and Republic of Ireland (FRS 102) - (Charities SORP FRS 102), the Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the UK and Republic of Ireland (FRS 102) and the Companies Act 2006.

The directors have taken advantage of the small entity exemption as noted in FRS 102 section 1A. The financial statements have been prepared on the historical cost basis.

Assets and liabilities are initially recognised at historical cost or transaction value unless otherwise stated in the relevant accounting policy or note.

c) Public benefit entity

The charitable company meets the definition of a public benefit entity under FRS 102.

d) Going concern

The directors consider that there are no material uncertainties about the charitable company's ability to continue as a going concern.

Key judgements that the charitable company has made which have a significant effect on the accounts include a commitment by The Glass-House Trust to make a grant of £100,000 per annum through March 2026 to the charitable company and a 3-year grant from the Ove Arup Foundation.

The directors do not consider that there are any sources of estimation uncertainty at the reporting date that have a significant risk of causing a material adjustment to the carrying amounts of assets and liabilities within the next reporting period.

e) Income

Income is recognised when the charity has entitlement to the funds, any performance conditions attached to the income have been met, it is probable that the income will be received and that the amount can be measured reliably.

Income from government and other grants, whether ‘capital’ grants or ‘revenue’ grants, is recognised when the charity has entitlement to the funds, any performance conditions attached to the grants have been met, it is probable that the income will be received and the amount can be measured reliably and is not deferred.

f) Interest receivable

Interest on funds held on deposit is included when receivable and the amount can be measured reliably by the charity; this is normally upon notification of the interest paid or payable by the bank.

g) Fund accounting

Unrestricted funds are donations and other incoming resources received or generated for the charitable Designated funds are unrestricted funds earmarked by the directors for particular purposes.

Restricted funds can only be used for particular restricted purposes within the objects of the charity. Restrictions arise when specified by the donor or when funds are raised for specific restricted purposes.

h) Expenditure and irrecoverable VAT

Expenditure is recognised once there is a legal or constructive obligation to make a payment to a third party, it is probable that settlement will be required and the amount of the obligation can be measured reliably. Expenditure is classified under the following activity headings:

• Expenditure on charitable activities includes the costs of activities undertaken to further the purposes of the charity and their associated support costs.

• Other expenditure represents those items not falling into any other heading.

Irrecoverable VAT is charged as a cost against the activity for which the expenditure was incurred.

39

The Glass-House Community Led Design

Notes to the financial statements

For the year ended 31 March 2024

1 Accounting policies (continued)

i) Allocation of support costs

Resources expended are allocated to the particular activity where the cost relates directly to that activity. However, the cost of overall direction and administration of each activity, comprising the salary and overhead costs of the central function, is apportioned on the following basis which are an estimate, based on staff time, of the amount attributable to each activity.

Where information about the aims, objectives and projects of the charity is provided to potential beneficiaries, the costs associated with this publicity are allocated to charitable expenditure.

Where such information about the aims, objectives and projects of the charity is also provided to potential donors, activity costs are apportioned between fundraising and charitable activities on the basis of area of literature occupied by each activity.

�	Improving Places	21.93%
�	Action Research	22.80%
�	Supporting Dialogue	29.30%
�	Innovating Practice	23.69%
�	Governance costs	1.64%
Support and governance costs are re-allocated to each of the activities on the f
estimate, based on staff time, of the amount attributable to each activity
�	Improving Places	21.93%
�	Action Research	22.80%
�	Supporting Dialogue	29.30%
�	Innovating Practice	23.69%

Support and governance costs are re-allocated to each of the activities on the following basis which is an estimate, based on staff time, of the amount attributable to each activity

Governance costs are the costs associated with the governance arrangements of the charity. These costs are associated with constitutional and statutory requirements and include any costs associated with the strategic management of the charity’s activities.

j) Tangible fixed assets

Items of equipment are capitalised where the purchase price exceeds £500. Depreciation costs are allocated to activities on the basis of the use of the related assets in those activities. Assets are reviewed for impairment if circumstances indicate their carrying value may exceed their net realisable value and value in use.

Where fixed assets have been revalued, any excess between the revalued amount and the historic cost of the asset will be shown as a revaluation reserve in the balance sheet.

Depreciation is provided at rates calculated to write down the cost of each asset to its estimated residual value over its expected useful life. The depreciation rates in use are as follows:

• Office equipment

3 years

k) Debtors

Trade and other debtors are recognised at the settlement amount due after any trade discount offered. Prepayments are valued at the amount prepaid net of any trade discounts due.

l) Cash at bank and in hand

Cash at bank and cash in hand includes cash and short term highly liquid investments with a short maturity of three months or less from the date of acquisition or opening of the deposit or similar account. Cash balances exclude any funds held on behalf of service users.

m) Creditors

Creditors and provisions are recognised where the charity has a present obligation resulting from a past event that will probably result in the transfer of funds to a third party and the amount due to settle the obligation can be measured or estimated reliably. Creditors and provisions are normally recognised at their settlement amount after allowing for any trade discounts due.

n) Pensions

The Company contributes to members' stakeholder pension schemes by making contributions of 8% of gross wages. Contributions are charged to the Statement of Financial Activities as they become payable in accordance with the rules of the scheme.

40

The Glass-House Community Led Design

Notes to the financial statements

For the year ended 31 March 2024

o) Financial instruments:

The charity only has financial assets and financial liabilities of a kind that qualify as basic financial instruments. Basic financial instruments are initially recognised at transaction value and subsequently measured at their settlement value.

2 Income from donations and legacies

2 Income from donations and legacies
3 Other income from Improving Places Action Research (was Research & Development) 3 Innovating Practice (was Policy & Advocacy) Other income from Innovating Practice Total income from charitable activities Improving Places Open University - Arts & Humanities Research Council y Council University of Sheffield - Arts & Humanities Research Council The Glass-House Trust (restricted archive grant) Income from charitable activities (continued) Supporting Dialogue (was Events) Ove Arup Foundation (restricted grant for Supporting Dialogue) Other income from Supporting Dialogue The Glass-House Trust (unrestricted core funding) Income from charitable activities	Unrestricted 100,000	Restricted -	2024 Total £ 100,000	2023 Total £ 100,000
	100,000	-	100,000	100,000
	Unrestricted 7,095 - 2,141 -	Restricted - - - - -	2024 Total £ 7,095 - 2,141 -	2023 Total £ 12,743 28,805 660 23,500
	9,236 Unrestricted - -	- Restricted 60,000 -	9,236 2024 Total £ 60,000 -	52,965 2023 Total £ 60,000 477
	- 8,676	60,000 -	60,000 8,676	60,477 42,799
	17,912	60,000	77,912	168,984

41

The Glass-House Community Led Design

Notes to the financial statements

For the year ended 31 March 2024

4a Analysis of expenditure

Charitable activities

Staff costs (Note 6) Direct Costs Other Indirect Costs Support Costs Governance costs Total expenditure 2024 Total expenditure 2023	Improving Places £ 40,151 150 - 40,301 6,973 262 47,536 44,422	Action Research £ 41,749 13,974 - 55,723 7,234 271 63,229 78,394	Supporting Dialogue £ 53,655 5,768 - 59,423 9,297 349 69,069 62,656	Innovating Practice £ 43,382 489 - 43,871 7,517 282 51,670 53,005	Governance costs £ 1,164 - - 1,164 - (1,164) - -	Support costs £ 2,995 - 28,027 31,021 (31,021) - - -	2024 Total £ 183,095 20,381 28,027 231,503 - - 231,503 238,477	2023 Total £ 177,759 32,765 27,953
								238,477 - -
								238,477
								-

The amount of expenditure from restricted funds in the year ending March 2024 was £77,904

42

The Glass-House Community Led Design

Notes to the financial statements

For the year ended 31 March 2024

4b Analysis of expenditure - Previous year (2023) comparative

Charitable activities

Staff costs (Note 6) Direct Costs Other Indirect Costs Support Costs Governance costs Total expenditure 2023	Improving Places £ 37,358 245 - 37,603 6,603 216 44,422	Action Research £ 49,515 21,344 - 70,859 7,296 239 78,394	Supporting Dialogue £ 45,794 7,829 - 53,623 8,747 286 62,656	Innovating Practice £ 41,305 3,347 - 44,652 8,089 264 53,005	Governance costs £ 1,005 - - 1,005 - (1,005) -	Support costs 2023 Total £ £ 2,782 177,759 - 32,765 27,953 27,953 30,735 238,477 (30,735) - - - - 238,477

The amount of expenditure from restricted funds in the year ending March 2023 was £83,500

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The Glass-House Community Led Design

Notes to the financial statements

For the year ended 31 March 2024

5 Net expenditure for the year

This is stated after charging / (crediting):

This is stated after charging / (crediting):
	2024	2023
	£	£
Depreciation	1,810	2,224
Accountants' remuneration (excluding VAT):
Independent Examination	3,240	2,585

6 Analysis of staff costs, director remuneration and expenses, and the cost of key management personnel

Staff costs were as follows:

Salaries and wages Social security costs Employer’s contribution to defined contribution pension schemes	2024 2023 £ £ 158,036 153,166 12,416 12,340 12,643 12,253 183,095 177,759

The following number of employees received employee benefits (excluding employer pension costs and employer's national insurance during the the year between

		2024	2023
£60,000	- £69,999	1	1
£59,000	- £59 ,999	-	-
£40,000	- £49,999	1	-
£30,000	- £39,000	-	2

The charity directors were not paid or received any other benefits from employment with the charity in the year (2023: £nil). No charity director received payment for professional or other services supplied to the charity (2023: £nil).

Directors' expenses represents the payment or reimbursement of travel and subsistence costs totalling £0 (2023: 66) incurred by 0 (2023: 1) members relating to attendance at meetings of the directors.

44

The Glass-House Community Led Design

Notes to the financial statements

For the year ended 31 March 2024

7 Staff numbers

The average number of employees (head count based on number of staff employed) during the year was as follows:

Support Supporting Dialogue Innovating Practice Governance Improving Places Action Research	2024 No. 0.69 0.72 0.92 0.75 0.05 0.02	2023 No. 0.74 0.82 0.98 0.91 0.06 0.02
	3.15	3.53

8 Related party transactions

One of the charity's directors, Alex Sainsbury, is also on the board of the charity's main core funder, The Glass-House Trust.

The Glass-House Trust made a grant of £100,000 to The Glass-House Led Community Design (2023: £100,000). There were no amounts outstanding at the year end. There are no donations from related parties which are outside the normal course of business and no restricted donations from related parties.

9 Taxation

The charitable company is exempt from corporation tax as all its income is charitable and is applied for charitable purposes.

10 Tangible fixed assets

Tangible fixed assets
Charge for the year At the end of the year Net book value At the end of the year At the start of the year Cost or valuation At the start of the year Additions At the end of the year Depreciation At the start of the year	Office Equipment £ 12,109 -	Total £ 12,109 -
	12,109	12,109
	8,076 1,810	8,076 1,810
	9,886	9,886
	2,223	2,223
	4,033	4,033

45

The Glass-House Community Led Design

Notes to the financial statements

For the year ended 31 March 2024

11 Debtors

Trade debtors Prepayments	2024 £ 60,175 2,475	2023 £ 10,959 3,352
	62,650	14,311

12 Creditors: amounts falling due within one year

Creditors: amounts falling due within one year
Taxation and social security Pensions Other creditors Accruals Trade creditors	2024 £ 33 3,738 186 3,595 3,240	2023 £ 287 4,879 (391) 3,476 6,502
	10,791	14,753

13a Analysis of net assets between funds (current year)

Analysis of net assets between funds (prior Tangible fixed assets Net current assets Net assets at the end of the year Tangible fixed assets Net current assets Net assets at the end of the year	General unrestricted £ - 35,436	Designated £ 2,223 -	Restricted £ - 65,775	Total funds 2023 £ 2,223 101,211
	35,436	2,223	65,775	103,434
	General unrestricted £ - 67,780 year)	Designated £ 4,033 -	Restricted - 83,679	Total funds 2022 £ 4,033 151,459
	67,780	4,033	83,679	155,492

13b Analysis of net assets between funds (prior year)

46

The Glass-House Community Led Design

Notes to the financial statements

For the year ended 31 March 2024

14a Movements in funds (current year)

Movements in funds (current year)
General funds Restricted funds Ove Arup Glass House Trust Total restricted funds Unrestricted funds Designated funds: Fixed Assets - Office Equipment Total unrestricted funds Total funds	At the start of the year £ 4,033 67,780	Incoming resources & gains £ - 119,445	Outgoing resources & losses £ (1,810) (151,789)	At the end of the year £ 2,223 35,436
	71,813	119,445	(153,599)	37,659
	73,599 10,080	60,000 -	(67,824) (10,080)	65,775 -
	83,679	60,000	(77,904)	65,775
	155,492	179,445	(231,503)	103,434

Ove Arup funding is year one of a three year, £60,000 per annum grant to support staff costs for the role of Wedesign Programme Manager, which sits within the Supporting Dialogue area of our work.

Glass House Trust funding is for creating an archive of our work.

47

The Glass-House Community Led Design

Notes to the financial statements

For the year ended 31 March 2024

14b Movements in funds (prior year)

General funds Restricted funds Ove Arup Glass House Trust Total restricted funds Unrestricted funds Designated funds: Fixed Assets - Office Equipment Total unrestricted funds Pension reserve Total funds Purposes of designated funds	At the start of the year £ 828 64,589	Incoming resources & gains £ 5,429 180,319	Outgoing resources & losses At the end of the year £ £ (2,224) 4,033 (177,128) 67,780 (179,352) 71,813 (45,706) 73,599 (13,420) 10,080 (59,126) 83,679 - - (238,478) 155,492
	65,417	185,748
	59,305 -	60,000 23,500
	59,305 -	83,500 -
	124,722	269,248

Fixed assets - This fund represents the net book value of the Charity's fixed assets.

48

The Glass-House Community Led Design

Notes to the financial statements

For the year ended 31 March 2024

15 Comparatives for the Statement of Financial Activities for 31 March 2023

Income from: Donations and Legacies Charitable Activities Improving Places Action Research Supporting Dialogue Innovating Practice Investments - Bank interest Total income Expenditure on: Charitable activities Improving Places Action Research Supporting Dialogue Innovating Practice Total expenditure Net income for the year and net movement in funds Reconciliation of funds: Total funds brought forward Total funds carried forward	Unrestricted Funds Total £ 100,000 12,743 29,465 477 42,799 263	Restricted Funds 2023 Total Total £ £ - 100,000 - 12,743 23,500 52,965 60,000 60,477 - 42,799 - 263 83,500 269,247 - 44,422 13,420 78,394 45,706 62,656 - 53,005 59,126 238,477 24,374 30,770 59,305 124,722 83,679 155,492
	185,747
	44,422 64,974 16,950 53,005
	179,351
	6,396 65,417
	65,417

16 Legal status of the charity

The charity is a company limited by guarantee and has no share capital. The liability of each member in the event of winding up is limited to £1.

49