by Phoebe Wagner (Poet & Community Artist) and Emma Skitmore (Manager of the Royal Standard Pub, Croydon)

Supported by Croydon Council’s London Borough of Culture Legacy Grant, the Royal Standard Pub Poetry Residency will include:

• Poetry Workshops exploring the community’s connections to the pub, documenting local narratives and enhancing my facilitation practice.
• Community co-design in collaboration with local residents, Royal Standard pub and the Artist Wellbeing Company, ensuring it reflects community needs, well-being and fosters local engagement. Whilst working with the pub's management to create a clear timeline and outcomes we’ll work together to ensure the project aligns with both our goals and can be delivered on time.
• Pub as writing studio by establishing a ‘poet’s seat’ in the pub, using the space for conversation and writing, which contributes to the cultural heritage by capturing contemporary community life.
• Creating and distributing a DIY Zine using the poetry from workshops and writing sessions will be compiled into a zine and distributed for free, making poetry accessible.

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Aims

Given Croydon’s loss of 113 pubs since 2000, this project will explore the role of pubs as community spaces for creativity and connection. Through this residency, Phoebe aims to document the evolving role of pubs and enhance their cultural legacy. With pubs closing at an alarming rate, she feels a sense of urgency to develop this work now and retain the momentum her short film (Pub)lic House gained for both the cause and her practice.

Throughout this research period, Phoebe hopes to learn:

• How to make poetry engaging: I want to discover effective methods to make poetry engaging for the pub’s patrons, many of whom may not see themselves as writers.
• Ways of creating in unexpected spaces: Working in a pub presents unique challenges and opportunities for creativity. Particularly when it is faced with social, financial and physical challenges of being a communal setting. I’m interested in understanding how to work with these challenges through setting realistic aims.
• Methods to plan the residency that create an inclusive space: I hope to better understand the way the pub works socially, logistically and culturally to ensure the residency resonates with this community. This could be by moving away from traditional workshop models that can feel alienating or programming other poets for guest sessions whose background aligns with the participants.

How can we measure when we’ve fulfilled those aims?

• journal - learning log - what activities do people respond to?
• anonymous poem submissions
• think of 1 or 2 questions that need answers
• income - royalty / nobility / peasant

Notes on the culture of The Royal Standard, Croydon

• everyone here loves to party