Opinion piece by Emma Harvey, CEO

Since the launch of the Citizens for Culture cultural delivery plan on 15 Jan 2026, we’ve seen a level of collaboration, energy and shared ambition in Bristol and the region that shows what’s possible when we come together around a common endeavour.

Though we've not been longlisted for UK City of Culture this time round, Bristol can still build our collective response to our citizen-led cultural plan with the same level of passion, openness and effort that went into making it.

Bristol's cultural identity is defined by what we choose to do collectively and the measure of us is not as a one-off moment, but in our ongoing way of being.

Citizens told us seeing one thing delivered from their plan would be amazing, and that's starting to happen. Responding to the call for greater openness and accountability, the sector is working together to build a more connected Bristol Culture Network, with clearer entry points and a more transparent, mapped approach so people can see where they fit and how to get involved. Bristol City Council’s commitment to protect cultural investment over the next three years, despite significant budget pressure is another clear sign that citizens' voices have been heard.

Bristol is, in many ways, a microcosm of the UK and as such we're the best place to test and build how culture can better include all of us. The Citizens’ Assembly showed what that can look like in practice: people coming together to shape decisions that reflect the city they live in. This city is what we make it, so get involved and let's do this Brizzle.

The vision we put forward

Our year of culture is our city’s response to a regional citizen-led cultural delivery plan, which sets out how, “Culture here should represent all of us, our stories, our voices and our future.” Bristol’s identity is defined by civic energy and radical history, and culture is a key mechanism for connecting the diverse stories and perspectives of the city and wider region. From Brunel and balloons to Banksy, Bristol is known for industrial heritage, rebellion and innovation. From the Bristol Bus Boycott, which helped pave the way for the Race Relations Act, to our City of Sanctuary status, the city has played a defining role in the UK’s civil rights history. From the Quaker abolition movement and Methodism to the toppling of the Colston statue, Bristol’s cultural life is deeply rooted in social change. Alongside this, our fiercely independent, community-driven cultural scene, from Bristol Old Vic, Aardman and St Paul’s Carnival to Massive Attack and IDLES, makes Bristol a distinctive and internationally recognised cultural destination.

This bid has been shaped as a collaborative, sector-led proposal using the Advice Process. Our vision is ambitious and unique, informed by the UK’s first citizen-led Cultural Delivery Plan for the West of England Combined Authority, created through the 2025 Citizens’ Assembly for Culture. The Plan articulates a shared ambition for “a fair, creative and connected region where culture brings people together, belongs to everyone and strengthens our communities.” Our bid aligns with Bristol City Council’s Corporate Strategy’s vision to “work together for a sustainable and equitable Bristol that enables everyone to be safe and well and thrive”. As major developments such as Temple Quarter and Creative Growth reshape the city, our year of culture anchors change in inclusion, weaving together history, creativity and civic life in ways that strengthen communities and enhance our profile.

At a time of global uncertainty, this UK City of Culture journey allows Bristol to tell our story of Radical Inclusion and a local-to-global city, rooted in justice and fairness, amplifying the voices we hear from least. Themes have been defined in response to the citizens’ cultural delivery plan, and reflect themes shared across the UK’s four nations; belonging, migration, climate justice and creative resistance. Building on the Assembly insights, our programme will invest in everyday cultural and civic infrastructure, skills development, and local creativity, alongside ambitious institutional work, to weave together the combination of stories, interventions and approaches that makes Bristol a very exciting place to live and visit.

Bristol’s cultural ecosystem extends beyond the city into the wider West of England, and our City of Culture year will connect festivals, heritage, creative industries and networks across the region and UK, using shared corridors and connectors - from rivers and music to digital innovation and emerging talent - to bring communities and sectors together and create a shared moment to imagine a better future through culture.

Art is circus, not economic gymnastics - Image by Khali Ackford

As Peter Holbrook, CEO of Social Enterprise UK, challenges the definition of the £428bn “impact economy”, our CEO Emma Harvey asks, what if we stopped counting?

Money Matters: Or why should we stop counting

A quiet shift’s been happening towards the language of economic impact underpinning most conversations about the value of arts, culture and civic life. It’s about maths right so it’s important, or so we tell ourselves. Only, it doesn’t hold any value to us or our people. A kind of gymnastics, only it's all contortion without a rhythm or flow and leaves us feeling hollow. If you’ve found yourself sleepwalking into measuring legitimacy through this lens and wondered, how did we get here? you're not alone.

Profit isn’t a dirty word. Many charities are social enterprises in some form and should absolutely measure profitability. We know what makes a surplus and what that surplus has to carry. Whoever you are - and especially if you have less of it - financial literacy is survival. Money matters.

But it is also reductive. It flattens complex human work into numbers never designed to hold it. And we’ve seen what happens when this logic hardens. Take NEET contracts reengaging 16-18 year olds. Early on at Trinity we were able to make contacts like this work, to give intensive support to those young people whose needed it most. But over successive contract cycles, payment-by-results milestones became unattainable for smaller providers, shifting provision towards volume. Quietly, young people were sorted into those who were fixable and fundable and those too costly to help. If value’s only defined economically, what becomes of us unviables?

Economic impact does little to convert minds not already convinced. The economic case for culture has been made repeatedly by folk with far more letters after their names than me. We know about local economic multiplier effects and how vibrant cultural spaces animate high streets. When art makes a place thrive speculative investment often follows. That movement of money is all the proof you need.

Getting small organisations to count what doesn’t matter all that much to people distracts and detracts, pulling scarce energy towards chasing ghosts. Time is spent proving, calculating and modelling experiences into metrics to services decision-makers we may never meet. It shapes programmes around what can be counted rather than what is needed. Measurement isn’t neutral; it consumes time, attention and worst of all our spirit. And like any beast, we’ll never fully sate it.

Economic impact language blurs the boundary between profit and purpose. Peter Holbrook, chief executive of Social Enterprise UK, recently warned of this risk, with the £428bn “impact economy” defined in a way favouring investor-led models over ones built explicitly for public benefit. When everything is framed within the same metrics it’s a game we can’t win. It allows those primarily driven by profit to say, “Oh yes, we also care too”. And then carbon offsetting permits continued extraction and recycling bins in clothing stores capture our sense of doing good while production patterns remain unchanged. Language that - if we also adopt it - softens the edges of power structures to allow them to remain unchallenged.

Community organisations cannot outcompete on terrain designed for capital and conquest. Adopting this language without challenge collapses extraction and reinvestment, shareholder return and community accountability. The promise that continued growth will eventually lift everyone impact rests on a fading ideology and many communities have lived long enough through iterations of that promise to treat it with scepticism. That’s dangerous especially right now because it deepens disenfranchisement of those who already have lost trust and faith in decision-makers' intentions. Growth is happening just not for you. You don’t matter to us.

When we centre growth as proof of value we risk reinforcing the same scarcity logic that traps minds and builds conflict. Someone else out there is winning whilst I’m losing. We risk aligning ourselves with a world that many already experience as failing them. When growth doesn’t translate into feeling better off, people look sideways to see who is benefitting. And then we're in cookie cartoon territory, where the dude sits behind a plate piled high pointing at the one due opposite the other whilst saying, He's taking what's yours. It's data to stoke tension between those who feel they’re losing out because of a notion of a transaction happening elsewhere that’s making someone else better off. And as we're all butting heads, deeper extraction continues unchecked.

Money matters for most only in the direct transaction sense. Pay people to do the work that needs to be done as well as you can afford. Don’t ask artists to work for free. Pay young people for their time. Pay communities for their advice. Do not ask people to do more with less while citing economic impact. Don’t push the boulder up the hill by exploiting your team or yourself. If a claim made somewhere doesn’t translate to wages if folks’ pockets it’s a story that rings hollow. I can’t pay my bills with your data.

None of this means abandoning accountability to funders. We should measure what keeps us afloat and be transparent about our finances. When asked to show GVA, it might be worth asking what they’re looking to understand from those numbers, who needs to be assured and whether the absence of economic data lessens the legitimacy of the work. If their response is to scratch their heads and say they don't know and that someone further up the chain is asking, that might at least give us pause for thought. Provide the data and still ask the questions, because following instructions unquestioningly is how we uphold bureaucracies at the expense of ourselves until we all wind up doing more work for less meaning, trapped in a system that rewards compliance over change.

There is no reason for thinking

That, if you give a chance for people to think or live

The arts of thought or life will suffer and become rougher

And not return more than you could ever give

Louis MacNeice, Autumn Journal (1939)

From Use or Ornament, Comedia’s report on the social value of the arts, 1997

At Trinity, I cannot promise folk I’ll make them rich. What I hope we offer is a place for people to come to find connection and build meaning together. A place where stories are shared, mistakes are made and power is practised differently, even if it doesn’t always work out. People come at times at a crossroads in their lives and often move onto bigger and better things. Like that old slouchy jumper, you love it till you wear it right through. It’s a place where value is measured by knowledge, energy and commitment to making things as good as possible with what we have.

The only real arbiter of wealth is the money in my pocket. In what I can give that I don’t need paid back. In the time that it affords me to worry about it less and care about what gives me meaning more. “What is it that breathes fire into the equations and makes a universe for them to describe?” said Stephen Hawking. Is the arbiter of our worth counted by pounds and pence or the smile on our face at the end of the day and the energy we find to get up again tomorrow. In this world of the now that’s rich with data yet poor on trust, culture’s the fuel for growth, turbo charging connection, courage and conviction. Right now, that may be the more honest thing to count.

This is an opinion piece by Emma Harvey, CEO

Let there be light! Carrek Ltd work to reveal lantern roof at Jacobs Wells Baths. Photos: Elliot Thingston

"Have you forgotten about Jacobs Wells?”

This was my partner, chatting to me last week because January’s been all systems go and all I've been chatting about of late is Citizens for Culture and deliberative democracy and City of Culture and creativity for everyone and Solar Opposites and Pokémon etc etc...

Like him, some of you may have walked past Jacobs Wells Baths and seen scaffolding shooting up and started wondering what on earth is going on inside. Has Emma forgotten about her building babies? Has she finally lost the plot?!

Perhaps.

But behind the boards and beneath the dust, something extraordinary is happening. And we let photographer Elliot Thingston (with his PPE on) inside to take a sneaky peak. As work continues overhead, the transformation may not yet be fully visible from the street. But believe me when I say, the Baths are beginning to breathe again.

As part of the ongoing restoration works to save this building and restore it for the community, heritage contractors Carrek Ltd have been working to remove the internal roof fabric. The old, damaged acoustic foam left behind from its time as a dance centre has revealed for the first time since 1984 the building's original glass lantern roof. When the foam started coming down, we began to see the outline of the lantern structure. To watch the main hall flood with daylight. That was special. You could suddenly understand the architect’s original intention.

What’s Happening Now
The team is removing damaged internal acoustic foam and carefully exposing the historic lantern structure. Original timber and ironwork are being assessed and restored, new glazing is being installed, solar panels added, and external masonry repaired. Phase 1 costs £2.2m and is scheduled to be completed Autumn 2026

Contractors can at times seem faceless, but not this crew. Keith Hoskins, Director of Carrek Ltd is one of the many true passionate folk involved in this recovery effort. I’ve been involved in a few capital projects over the years with my other building baby, the Trinity Centre (don’t worry, I haven’t forgotten her either), and this is the first time I’ve seen someone so utterly determined to climb eight tiers of scaffolding just to witness a moment of restoration. But that’s what a project like this does. It pulls people upward.

A passion project for spirited souls just like Keith. When I was chatting to him up there in the roof heavens he spoke excitedly about the original timber roof noting that, while some areas of the structure have deteriorated over time, the overall quality and craftsmanship of the materials and original build is remarkable.

The team’s priority is to conserve and repair as much of the historic fabric as possible. The existing timber frame will be carefully restored, with a new glass roof introduced above it; one that honours the original design while ensuring the structure performs to contemporary building and environmental standards.

What’s Happening Next
Phase 2 will focus on the restoration of internal fabric and adaptation of the space in response to community consultation. This will include renovation of the interior, a new entrance, WCs, and lift, as well as interpretation and signage, plus a heritage learning and participation programme. Phase 2 costs are estimated at £5.5m and are expected to begin in Spring 2027 (subject to funding)

There’s something deeply symbolic about light returning to this building. Jacobs Wells Baths has always been a place of public gathering and shared experience. Seeing the lantern revealed I hope will serve as a reminder that this isn’t just restoration. It’s a revival.

This is why I am so in love with old buildings. Because, at the beginning, there’s a surge of excitement in that moment of possibility. Then the hard graft begins and it’s all scaffolding, dust, rubble and drilling and pulling things apart and board meetings and spreadsheets and budgets and cost rationalising and more meetings and and and.

And for a while, hope vanishes behind hoardings. And we find it hard to hold onto that end goal of a reimagined space for us. But it’s precisely in these messy, unseen stages that something extraordinary starts to happen. The foundations are laid and that art of the possible truly begins, nudging us steadily closer to that magical moment when the space opens once again and the vision becomes a reality for everyone.

It’s not always easy to create moments inside the building to connect with supporters while major works like this are underway. So, I hope these images offer a glimpse into that window of possibility. A way to see the craftsmanship and care that hides behind the scaffolding and for you all to continue to have faith in us.

I share this to give love and thanks to my dedicated professional team and so people can feel part of the journey. We’re deeply grateful to our community, funders and partners for sticking with us through the complex stages of restoration, and we’re hopeful about what this moment of light signals: the start of the future of this extraordinarily handsome building.

Phase 3 to be continued...?

Because this is not a building story. It’s a flippin’ love story. And all the best love stories come in three parts.

By Emma Harvey, CEO

Thanks to our funders: We’re incredibly grateful for the continued support of our funders and supporters, including MHCLG (Community Ownership Fund), Architectural Heritage Fund, Historic England, The Nisbet Trust, John James Foundation, Merchant Venturers Charitable Trust, Centrica: Energy for Tomorrow, The Pilgrim Trust, Bristol City Council, Sylvia Waddilove and all our individual donors and sponsors. We could not do this without you x

Opportunity: Development Consultant – Jacobs Wells Baths

Trinity Community Arts is seeking an experienced Development Consultant to support our National Lottery Heritage Fund Stage 2 application for the restoration of the Grade II–listed Jacobs Wells Baths.

This fixed-fee role (£9k, Feb–June 2026) will lead on finalising the Business Operating Plan and 5-year budget, using learning from pilot activity to evidence a sustainable future for this landmark community arts and heritage space.

The consultant will work with the CEO and Trinity Events Team and other project professionals including the capital team to provide “proof of concept” for how the space will work in the future. This is needed to inform key documentation (already drafted) that is required to submit our National Lottery Heritage Fund S2 Delivery Application (deadline 26 May).

Key programme dates

👉 Read the full brief and apply by 31 January 2026, 9am

The Seers, Welcome to Deadtown, 1990

On the day of the announcement that Bristol intends to bid to become UK City of Culture 2029, Trinity's CEO Emma Harvey reflects on comfort, justice and freedom of expression...

Folk are fed up with feeling broke. With political change being slow. With public services not working properly. Fed up of being polite and patient while people with power blame and game. Time poverty shrinks our lives. The ground beneath us feels uncertain.

This town is dead, it's a living hell...

I listen to the Seers and scroll through socials. It's the day after Martin Luther King Jr Day. A day that since Regan’s office has been marked as a US federal holiday. Jeanne Theoharis - who's has spent decades interrogating the myths we tell about one of the most recognisable civil rights activists - reminds us, injustice is comfortable for too many people. Silence permits cruelty. Comfort begets control.

A legacy that may have at times become flattened into a dreamy utopia, with King upheld as a non-threatening ‘colourblind’ figure. This isn’t accidental. It reassures the status quo and eliminates discomfort, to uphold politeness at the expense of justice.

The removal of free national parks on MLK Day and Juneteeth may serve as a reminder of King’s rage at economic and health injustice, his clarity about power and the complicity of politeness. His insistence that financial and political imbalances block true democracy if not robustly challenged. Politeness + comfort ≠ change.

Back in Bristol, I read a newsletter from Curiosity UnLtd who's Creativist leader Julz Davis been driving a campaign for Bristol to celebrate it’s role as Home of Civil Rights in the UK. Recognition of Bristol as a city of changemakers not waiting for permission and making their own opportunities.

That's the spirit of Bristol that matters. Not as branding, but as a way of being and just getting on with stuff. Because waiting for permission is another form of comfort. And comfort is what shrinks our minds and our worlds.

Art doesn’t decorate movements. It sustains them, says Julz. Creativity that's about truth-telling and shining a light on injustice where regular discourse falls short. A culture of asking difficult questions whilst also celebrating joyously that helps us imagine the ancestors we want to be and the role we want to plan in the world we’ll eventually leave behind.

We’re all frogs in the pot. Going along with process because we’re all so deep in it. Accepting the terms. Competing for funds like City of Culture and Pride in Place. A window of opportunity, but a window nonetheless that risks creating a sense of scarcity and of pitting places and communities against each other for central government funding, even though we know culture is a public good and civic life is essential to all of us. Without addressing that power of how we consider and distribute resources, participation is theatre not justice.

I want to shout but I can’t make a sound
Without the whole town coming down
There’s no-one around
I can’t dance, I can’t sing, I can’t do anything
Welcome to deadtown

The song continues as I read social posts asking so what...what can culture do about all that? These things tend to be gravy trains for a few. It will make no difference to most of us. This can be true, but that does not mean that we should not at least try.

That's the challenge of a UK City of Culture year for Bristol and we must take up that challenge if the benefits are to be felt. Bristol, like the UK doesn't lack creativity and is seen to be comparatively culturally resourced. But this hides more complex narratives, not least that we have a creative workforce that delivers far beyond the city's geographical boundaries, working across the UK on major cultural commissions and festivals, including playing visible roles in the delivery of City of Culture programmes in other UK cities.

And yet still we're a city whose networks can feel opaque and decision-making spaces unreachable. Systems that aren’t designed to make space for the art of the possible. People are muted. Expression is risky. Joy is rationed.

On the flipside, culture is passion. It’s activism. It’s identity. It's a shared memory. It’s the space where difficult conversations can happen - not as abstract debates, but as continued deliberation - a relay race passing the baton onto the next generation to build from where we tried and got some stuff right but still have work to do. Culture doesn’t change the world on its own: it creates the conditions for change. In a sea of voices telling us what to think and who’s right and who’s wrong it gives us a moment to close our eyes and hear our own voice and a tool to convert that voice into action to take about what matters to us.

The real test isn’t whether the whole city agrees or disagrees that we should go for this. It’s whether we stay in the room when things start to get uncomfortable - or even show up in the room when we’re invited. Discomfort isn’t the enemy - it's possibility. Talking to someone you disagree with and softening our edges. Taking a chance on a new artwork and seeing the world through a different lens. Speaking to a stranger and learning something new. Letting your certainty wobble to bring a skip to your step.

New worlds are built from shared courage. We don’t have to have all the answers right now. That’s why it’s called work. Believe in this. Believe in us. We’re all we’ve got. We’re our best chance. The work that needs doing will only come from us, together - locally and globally - communities refusing silence, complicity, refusing the polite status quo.

Shout in support of Bristol UK City of Culture. Shout in disagreement. Shout from the rooftops. It’s our time to bring our global town alive. Let’s go dream big.

This is an opinion piece by Emma Harvey. Click here to read more about Bristol's UK City of Culture bid.

Trinity's backing Bristol's bid to become the next UK City of Culture - a title that celebrates creativity, community, and the power of culture to transform lives.

“Bristol looks like a richly creative city from the outside, but too many artists are forced to leave because they can’t afford to live or build a sustainable career here. UK City of Culture could be a once-in-a-generation chance to carefully develop the whole ecosystem from affordable studios and skills to commissions and progression so talent can stay, grow and thrive, and help forge a new generation of artists in the city.” Paula Orrell, Trustee

In 2024 Bristol's Green Party set out how Bristol prides itself on being a diverse, creative and green city and their commitment to lead a Bristol regional bid to become the UK’s city of culture. Following a committee meeting today, 20 Jan 2026, Bristol's councillors voted to honour that comitment and take forward a bid for the city to become the next UK City of Culture, 2029.

Bristol City Council's Culture Team will submit an Expression of Interest to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, marking the beginning of a journey that could see Bristol shortlisted for one of the country’s most prestigious cultural honours.

Winning the title could bring significant opportunities for Bristol for years to come, attracting visitors, creating jobs, and strengthening the city’s cultural infrastructure. Most importantly, we are backing this bid because of its potential to ensure culture is accessible to everyone, everywhere in Bristol.

National evidence shows how creative engagement is a vital pillar for a happier, healthier life. Trinity's team, and Board are excited by the possibility of bringing that sense of joy to the heart of the city.

Developing the Expression of Interest was the result of a sector-led collaboration of local culture leaders and organisations, in response to the Citizens for Culture Delivery Plan produced by a citizens' assembly, published 15 January 2026. In line with Bristol's Co-Production Policy and the ongoing work of Citizens for Culture, if the city is invited to submit a full bid, a grant of £60,000 will be available so any future application will be developed in partnership with residents, artists, community groups, businesses and cultural organisations.

The film below is just a flavour of what Bristol could bring to a UK City of Culture year and we are excited to be part of shaping the journey together towards a creative and joyous 2029.

You can show your support by backing Bristol's bid using the images, above, and hashtags, below.

#ChargedbyCreativity #UKCityofCulture

Radix Big Tent Festival of Ideas, 2022

Exicited? Click here to read an opinion piece by our CEO, Emma