Between Jan 2025 – Summer 2025, KWMC and WeCanMake have collaborated on a new project called Neighbourhood Tradeschools.
Neighbourhood Tradeschools
In 2025, we launched Neighbourhood Tradeschool, a new community learning model designed to make practical skills accessible for everyone. The Tradeschool ran in themed learning blocks: DIY skills, Natural Materials, Exploring Energy, and a summer of Making Together workshops. These workshops all focused on building confidence with tools, making with natural materials, making useful items for home and local spaces, and exploring creative approaches to everyday challenges. Each session offered a friendly, supportive environment where people could learn something new, meet neighbours, share food, and build community connections.
In 2025, Tradeschool was funded and developed on a project called ‘Transforming Energy Together’ with Centre for Sustainable Energy, part of a wider NetZero project run by Bristol City Council. We explored what a just transition could look like and tried out different ways of engaging community members in this work:
- How we can introduce complex topics in a creative hands on way?
- What are the conditions needed for a kind, caring and supportive learning experience for all?
- What would a ‘just transition’ mean and how could we deliver it with our communities in Knowle West?
- People are often left out of future conversations on where they live and energy schemes. How can these people be at the forefront of new approaches to energy?
The way we designed Tradeschools
Easy entry point:
Neighbourhood Tradeschools were designed for beginners with no previous skills or knowledge required. They created an open space for people who might not usually see themselves in a DIY or making setting. We were committed to accessibility – particularly for women, the global majority, working-class communities, LGBTQIA+ people, neurodivergent and disabled people, and those currently out of work.
Inclusive and accessible:
We recruited tradeschoolers locally at events round Knowle West, and online in queer community groups. We designed the Tradeschools to carefully accommodate everyone’s access needs. This included.. Every workshop had two creative hands-on activities, whether this was learning about how cork grows, exploring shared solar power systems, or creating a bird box.
Tangible and visual:
We broke topics down and developed tools, diagrams and physical scales to help visualise concepts, making complex topics tangible and accessible. For example, when exploring “what is a material’s cost to the earth to produce and use?” we broke this down over several sessions and used hands-on, visual demos of the lifecycle of different materials.
1. DIY Skills
We started with DIY tools with Caroline Henn, where everyone learnt how to use simple power tools, to make bug hotels and bird boxes for their neighbourhoods.
2. Natural Materials
We then had 6 weeks of making with our hands using natural materials. This included visits from Tim Crabtree (learning from his enthusiasm about hemp and processing) and Bristol Community Pottery (using Knowle West clay slip to decorate our number tiles for our homes). We even clay plastered a wall at the Factory!
3. Exploring Energy
In our last sessions, we explored solar energy by creating small solar powered kits. We first chatted about the personal impact of energy: our energy bills, how expensive they were sometimes, how we could personally save energy, and how energy is lost in the home. We then explored wider: how energy is produced, what is the national grid, how does energy get sold to us, what would shared energy systems look like on the street, and how can we generate our own energy ourselves?
The Impact of Tradeschools
Between January and June 2025, 47 participants took part in 24 workshops, contributing over 600 hours of activity. Most participants were women, disabled and/or neurodivergent, with 50% identifying as LGBTQIA+.
- 66% of attendees were women
- 11% identified as non-binary
- 22% identified as men
- 20% identified as part of a global majority background
- 60% identified as disabled
- 33% identified as neurodivergent
- 50% identified as LGBTQIA+
Participants gained a broad toolkit of new DIY and making skills: learning to saw in a line, drill properly, measure accurately, and use a range of tools with confidence. Many described surprise and excitement at mastering equipment they had previously avoided.
Using a saw without getting annoyed – I can do it!
I feel powerful and capable.
Participants described feeling powerful, capable, curious, and excited. The welcoming atmosphere and supportive staff helped people feel comfortable to try, fail, and succeed, building confidence, reducing fear of mistakes, and fostering belonging.
The welcoming, non-judgemental atmosphere made us feel comfortable.
It was such a friendly, kind, welcoming safe space for me. I was put at ease and was helped so much. To come away with such positive memories and a bug hotel and bird house I can be proud of. Connecting with my community is so important too.
It’s been helpful for me have some focus and direction in my life whilst experiencing much immense difficulties […] so good for my mental health and wellbeing.
By the end of 2025, half of all participants had already used their new skills to improve their homes, and a third planned future projects! Many spoke of wanting to make furniture, undertake home repairs, or learn more advanced trades.
I’m not afraid to make holes in my wall now.
I want to make more things – a coffee table, a shelf, a cupboard.
Special thanks
Special thanks to support from The Transforming Energy Together programme, run by Centre for Sustainable Energy. Knowle West was one of three communities selected for the programme. Funded by Innovate UK as part of Bristol City Council’s Mission Net Zero project. The Mission Net Zero project aims to make Bristol a more sustainable and inclusive city with the ambition of becoming carbon neutral and climate resilient by 2030.
Photo credits: Ibi Feher.
Next Steps for Tradeschools
DIY Trade Schools show how local, creative, and inclusive learning spaces can deliver tangible social and environmental value, enabling residents to build confidence, skills, and stronger neighbourhoods. With further funding, we could:
- Expand to reach more residents across Knowle West and South Bristol
- Offer structured progression into advanced DIY and retrofit training
- Strengthen partnerships and embed community-led sustainability skills
- Deepen impact on wellbeing, self-reliance, and community pride
If you’re interested in collaborating or funding Tradeschools, please email chloe.meineck@kwmc.org.uk