Workspaces for Creative Enterprise: Selected Case Studies

Compiled by Keith Hackett

• A Foundation
  
• Hatcham Park Mews
• Herbie Treeheads Dinosaur Show
• Persistence Works
• Creative Space Management
• Annex Inc Limited
• Blundell Street Works Ltd
• The International Centre for Digital Content
• Toxteth TV Ltd.
• Keith Hackett
• Cedar Farm Gallery
• Eden Artisans
• Farfield Mill Arts and Heritage Centre
• Yew Tree Barn

A Foundation

The AFoundation is a charitable trust, established to support the contemporary visual arts. It runs a former school – Rochelle – located in Shoreditch in Central London, as well as buildings near the south docks in Central Liverpool.

Established as a Charitable Trust, the AFoundation uses its income to support visual arts activities, including exhibitions, studio bursaries, creating educational resources, increasing public access to art, the provision of workspaces and other support for artists.

It also garners other income and uses this alongside its own financial resources. It runs Rochelle – a complex of three buildings formerly a school in East London. It acquired this property some five years ago, and has recently converted the buildings into a complex of workspaces, an exhibitions space and a canteen and cafe / meeting area.

Its objectives in doing this are to generate "a creative community" that "can cross-over between artistic practice and exhibitions". It aims to do this on an enterprise model, and as a result, readily accepts that is has to generate necessary income from the workspaces it provides.

The buildings were launched in 2006 and as a consequence of the high running costs associated with the building, it does find that the studio spaces it can offer are out of the reach of most visual artists – but affordable by more commercial creative businesses such as fashion and graphic design companies, arts administration etc.

It freely acknowledges the problems this can cause less-well-off artists but states its aim as "using its resources to create a sustainable model capable of supporting visual artists in other ways" – through the exhibitions, studio bursaries and other support mentioned earlier.

In total, the workspaces cover 7,000 square foot and the exhibition area another 3,000. So income from one sector in the creative industries is re-used to support activities amongst another – an interesting cross-over subsidy model, with clear sustainable objectives.

Further developments are planned within the building complex – including shared three-month long affordable work spaces designed to provide working space for emerging creative practitioners and encourage collaborative working across art-forms and between practices.

Hatcham Park Mews

Each unit is three stories high with floor areas ranging between 1,055 and 1,184 square feet. The scheme comprises ten units totalling 1,034.5 square metres (11,132 square feet) and averaging 1,113 square foot per unit). Sale price per unit averaged £238,500 when first marketed – equivalent to £214.29p a square foot capital purchase - plus duty.

50% of the units were sold based on the plans alone and all were sold on scheme completion. Built to be low cost and affordable – in London’s terms at least - the scheme is of interest in three respects as regards creative workspace.

First, the workspaces within each unit were customised – and built to the purchasers specifications within a part of the property chosen by the buyer – which means that the workspace does not simply occupy the garage space on the ground floor which is a more typical model.

Second each unit is registered both for Council Tax and Business Rates – which formalises the work aspects of the scheme – and hopefully protects each unit to an extent for re-conversion back to simple residential.

hird, GLE’s records show that 40% of the purchasers were working in the creative industries – as performers, photographers and musicians. Live and workspace is a particular solution where property prices are high, or where land is scarce. It also appeals to professions and types of enterprises, which are under-capitalised and so find difficulties purchasing or renting separate residential and work-related spaces.

The GLE model goes a considerable way to protecting the work elements within the scheme and so is to some extent a model of best practice – as some other live-work schemes, particularly in rural locations, have been seen as mechanisms to avoid planning restraints on house building.

Live and work schemes provide a customised solution for the current working arrangements of many creatives – home working with a genuine workspace attached.

Herbie Treeheads Dinosaur Show

Based out of a barn on the A35 on the outskirts of Bridport, the Show tours in a custom-made tent that is used to house the show and audience. But the purpose of the tent is more than simply housing the show. Herbie Treehead also works with the festivals in order to promote other events and acts in the tents, and with other groups of performers seeking a venue in which to perform.

So the tent itself acts as a temporary workspace for performers (and authors, poets and other artists) and as the focus for “temporary festivals”. In this context the group provide both events programming expertise, and run the back and front of house facilities. The group have been working in this way for the past two years – having purchased the tent, and built the dinosaurs, following a joint personal investment by the individuals involved of £75,000.

This investment took the form of a commercial loan borrowed from a bank – based on a business case presented by the group themselves. The group is now in the process of working to pay off the loan – and anticipate that they will do so. They then plan to secure some woodland and buildings on the Dorset Heritage Coast – and open their version of Jurassic Park as a permanent home-base for the Show.

Their aim is to own this facility and to use it as an asset to develop similar cultural activities amongst as wider group of creatives. Herbie stresses however, that they are not a tent hire company – rather, the tent is a key component within a cultural product. The tent itself is owned separately – with the remainder of the company operated through Treehead Ltd. This two company model protects both aspects of the operations.

Persistence Works

This is the first building developed and owned by Yorkshire ArtsSpace Society. Opened in 2001, this building in central Sheffield has 51 studios providing accommodation for 67 artists and craftspeople. It cost £5.3m to construct and was financed by the national Lottery (£3.5m) and ERDF (£1.8m).

The building has a reception and exhibition area, organises an Open Studios Programme twice annually, and houses a public arts space with artists in residence.  It receives £40,000 subsidy from the Arts Council to support this artistic programme – covering the costs of the studios from the rental income.

The origins of the building lie in the ArtSpace Society, who previously occupied a poor quality rented building elsewhere in Sheffield. The Society – which combines the interests of crafts people and visual artists – recognised a need for a modern building – in part on the grounds of security of tenure but also for safety and financial benefits as well.

As a result they raised finance for a purpose built property, designed to provide a flexible range of workspaces and to minimise the running costs associated with these. Rent is £2.50 a square foot – regardless of the size of the studio – and services charges extra.

The Society attracts Business Rate Relief because of its charitable status and chooses to subsidise the 20% it does pay from its rental income. The Society aims to make this the first of a number of workspace developments – seeking to build a range of facilities in the future including smaller units.

The building offers an example of a purpose built property and demonstrates the significant saving that can be made for the tenant occupying such a type of bespoken property development – which are of course of direct benefit to the artist and craftspeople themselves.

Creative Space Management

The company was set up in 2005, with the objective to create and manage quality creative workspace operated in partnership with Regional Development Agencies, similar public bodies as well as the private sector. The company seeks to achieve this via strategic partnerships designed to provide the operators with economic and cultural benefits, and the tenants with quality workspace and added value services designed to reinforce and grow their businesses.

These services include support for home-based creatives through initiatives such as vitual ofice services and drop-ins for sole traders, as well as managed workspaces and business incubators. The company's director-shareholders are the same management team which developed the Huddersfield Media Centre - and were then commissioned to establish the Round Foundry by Yorkshire Forward.

They left the Huddersfield Centre when their proposal for a Management Buy-Out (MBO) was turned down in favour of a more traditional public-subsidy solution, and forged a partnership with a leading commercial regeneration business that manages socially responsible investments for pension funds. The company currently manages facilities within the Round Foundry, and is in discussions in regard to a number of other projects with its various strategic partners and investors.

Toby Hyam, the managing director is clear about the difference between their company and more mainstream large-scale commercial property operations, stating "we aim to achieve results through a value-driven but also commercial approach. Investing in culture and creativity is as much a part of our jobs as ensuring that our buildings are based around vibrant communities.”

www.creativespaceman.com

Annex Inc Limited

This is a property and business incubation company, which emerged from a “buy-out” of the property assets of the former Liverpool Everyman Theatre. Annex Inc Ltd now owns and lets six properties along Liverpool’s Hope Street Corridor, which house mainly small performing arts, media, TV production and design companies. Its activities focus on offering flexible short and medium term lettings for growing small creative businesses. The business specifically seeks to sustain and grow the creative business cluster in the Hope Street area of Liverpool. The origins of the business lie in the financial collapse of the Everyman Theatre back in mid-1990s. A tenant of the then theatre, the Everyman Bistro, was housed in the basement of the theatre where it provided a successful cafe-restaurant bar.

When the Everyman went into liquidation the management of the Bistro approached the receiver to buy the freehold of the theatre – in order to preserve their own business and exert some controls over the future use of the theatre’s main auditorium – put simply, to stop it becoming a bingo hall. The response of the receiver was positive – yes, but ....... And the but? It was that the Bistro company had to buy everything the theatre owned, which included two other properties on Hope Street used as rehearsal rooms and administrative offices. These properties themselves had tenants who paid rent to the theatre – and provided the theatre with a considerable source of earned income. Faced with this offer - which they could not refuse - the Bistro approached a colleague and friend, who was also a film accountant and business person.

Together they set up two companies – one to purchase the Theatre Freehold on behalf of the Bistro, and the second to purchase and manage the wider assets. This second company was Annex Inc Ltd. Since 1995, this company has bought several more buildings as they have come up for sale along Hope Street, and now provides flexible workspaces – mainly, but not exclusively, for creative businesses – over 26,000 square feet of property. Located at the heart of one of Liverpool’s cultural districts, the company has played a very significant role in protecting the cultural ambience in the area generally - choosing to maintain a focus on office accommodation whilst property companies across most of the rest of the City Centre were selling-out, for residential conversion schemes.

As a result the company has become one of the main providers of creative workspace in the city. It remains completely reliant on private funds and bank borrowings – and at no stage has it received grant – although a number of its tenants are themselves grant-subsidised – such as the Hope Street Project, and the Playhouse and Everyman Theatre Trust. More recently the company has been in discussions with this Trust concerning a possible redevelopment on part of the site, as part of rebuilding a re-modelled Liverpool Theatre. For Annex Inc the biggest problems it faces are in the nature of the properties it own and the challenges it faces making these DDA compliant.

Blundell Street Works Ltd

The complex includes a live music and venue and restaurant, offices for digital design businesses and visual artists’ studios. It has six major shareholders and is a Limited Company.

The business was originally established for three reasons – to demonstrate that cultural activities could transform neglected areas of a City centre, to subsidise artists workspaces through commercial cross-over funds, and to test a possible “equity for rent” model designed to support and intensify local economic activities and transform anchor tenants into equity shareholders.

The company bought its first property in 1998 with a mix of personal and bank loans and share equity. This building was converted over the next two years – to house a live music venue bar and restaurant plus two floors of “digital company incubation spaces” then run by the International Centre for Digital Content based at Liverpool John Moores University.

The company bought a second building on the same block two years later, and converted this to a second stage for the live music operator plus a floor of artists studios totalling 4,000 square foot. The remaining two floors continued unimproved and are used a storage – mainly for creative companies. Again, the purchase was made using a mix of personal loans and commercial borrowings – all repaid with interest at commercial rates.

The development has been highly influential in developing a “feel” and “creative focus” for the wider area – which now also houses properties own by the A Foundation and used as gallery spaces in association with the Liverpool Biennial Festival. Blundell Street Works has had the provision of artists workspace, including visual artists studios as one of its key objectives, and uses rental incomes from the cafe bar and design businesses to subsidise the rents required from the artists studios.

So it provides a model for achievable workspace spanning a variety of art-forms and professions. The rental yield is also used to re-pay borrowings, which it is anticipated will be largely cleared by 2008 whereupon a significant dividend will be paid to shareholders.

The International Centre for Digital Content

This is part of Liverpool John Moores University. It has four divisions - undergraduate level courses and post-graduate research, community and professional services and consultancy, blue-skies and applied research, and a business incubator to develop spin-out digital enterprises.

From origins over a decade ago as the University’s Learning Methods Unit, the Centre has grown very significantly, attracting substantial public funds from both the Higher Education funding mechanisms and from European Structural Fund Programmes. Support from the Structural Funds has taken two forms – ESF to support training courses and ERDF for capital projects and business development schemes.

These capital projects have included the development of premises, whilst the business support schemes have focused particularly on support for digital enterprise growth. This business growth is provided through a digital business incubation centre – called DigitalInc.

Originally based in rented property at Blundell Street, this facility offers rented desk spaces, broad band and digital technologies, shared meeting facilities and business advisors – all together in one place. It also links to training programmes and academic support offered through other divisions within ICDC.

DigitalInc originally occupied 5,000 square foot of office space containing some dozen companies and thirty hot desks, when first established in Blundell Street in 2001 – but has since expanded on relocation to the former Marconi Factory site in Edge Lane in Liverpool. ICDC now occupy a small part of this site – which overall contains in excess of 200,000 square foot of business space – most of which remains empty at present.

The arrangements with the incubator businesses include an arrangement for sharing intellectual property rights in the products created – in exchange for low rent terms. This arrangement is structured by ICDC to provide a success share and source of earned revenue long-term. Whilst popular as a principle this is proving hard to enforce in reality – with the companies themselves resisting the loss of their IPR.

Time spent in the incubator is in theory, limited, but again, this arrangement is also proving flexible as well. Certainly successful companies have emerged from the Incubator – and one, JAB Design, now occupies the former offices of the original incubator, on the top two floors of Blundell Streets Works Ltd. The NWDA has recently opened a move-on space adjacent to the incubator – although the rental income from this space goes back to the NWDA rather than ICDC.

Toxteth TV Ltd

Toxteth TV owns two buildings and leases the other. It sets rent levels, agrees tenancies, maintains and lets properties, and liases with tenants – current and future. It employs staff – currently a Chief Executive, a buildings manager, her assistant and cleaners. It also contracts for maintenance, and for technical services, runs the assets registers, does insurance cover etc. It trades, and receives all the rents and other charges such as studio hires. From this it pays all its costs. If there is anything left over, it passes this through to a charity to undertake charitable works as defined by the objectives of the charity. It can make application for grant and has benefited from £2.8m grant in the past – from the then Capital Modernisation Fund, and ERDF Objective One. But in the main it is expected not to apply for grants in the future. This company is VAT registered because it trades. It co-ordinated the capital works programme for Toxteth TV, and as a result reclaimed considerable sums of VAT on the capital programme. Its activities are supported by Splendid Things.

This is a registered charity. Its objectives are to support and encourage educational activities in the field of media and to alleviate poverty through such activities – classic charitable objectives. Its trustees are the same as those of Toxteth TV Ltd, and it derives its income from surpluses created by Toxteth TV Ltd and through making applications for grants and funds from public and charitable sources. It employs a member of staff whose responsibility is for development and additional fundraising. The activities it funds are either run in house or out-sourced, often to organisations and companies located in the Toxteth TV business cluster – but all activities are project focussed. In short, if Splendid Things seeks to encourage an activity it must identify where the funds will come from – and no funds means no activities. One clear advantage is that a problem with one organisation cannot take down another. In this way development activities are undertaken as and when the monies become available through trading activities undertaken by Toxteth TV Ltd.

Keith Hackett

He is best known for his detailed knowledge of utilising public and private finances in Europe to grow jobs and generate employment in the less traditional industrial sectors, and he authors and speaks regularly on these topics. He has worked as a sole-trader since 1986 – and since that date, has been registered self-employed with the UK Revenue, and returned accounts to them on an annual basis.

During all that time has worked from an office space of some type. This space has changed with his circumstances – but typically this has comprised a space of some 15 square meters (150 square foot). It has required a phone connection, heating, light and storage space plus desk and computer. It has also needed to be insured and secure.

This workspace has always been housed within his home – but has not been registered for Business Rates. Keith appointed an accountant in 1986 who prepares a set of account annually without an audit. These accounts form the basis for an income return to the revenue in respect of his professional work as a sole-trader. Within these accounts an allowance is made for the costs incurred using the space as an office. These costs cover a proportion of the overall heat, light and insurance costs on the house as a whole.

Cedar Farm Gallery

This is located on the site of a former pig farm, close to the village of Maudsley, near Ormskirk in Lancashire. Began as an effort to diversify when pig-farming began to get into financial difficulties in the 1990s, the gallery complex has grown from a single converted building. Farming ceased completely on the site in 2001, and it now operates entirely as a commercial enterprise, converting and running a complex of former agricultural buildings that now house cafes, shops, a gallery, artists studios and a teaching space.

The whole complex remains in the ownership of the farming family that started the enterprise – and has been funded completely by the owners themselves. They run the enterprise as a wholly commercial operation, renting spaces to the various enterprises involved. This includes twenty individual artists, craftspeople and creative businesses. The galleries as a whole are a considerable visitor attraction – and had 60,000 visits last year.

They are also a significant source of local employment in a largely rural community – with in excess of 50 full-time equivalent jobs on the site. Significantly the teaching space is also a local community resource – although Julie Bailey who owns and runs the operations – stresses that it in no way seeks to compete with the local village hall.

As a teaching space it concentrates on arts and crafts focused classes although it has also become a significant venue for yoga and movement classes – because it has under-floor heating. Julie, who has driven the developments for many years, has been quietly but consistently critical of the public sector and its attitude to the gallery – in two particular areas. The first concerns planning conditions – which her operation meets because it is housed in former agricultural buildings.

The second concerns her organisation’s inability to qualify for grant-aid – particularly to support capital works. On this second issue, she cannot understand why public organisations providing facilities for artists get subsidy and she does not. That said, she has had public assistance in two areas for which she is grateful – she was a partner in North West Arts Board’s Setting Up Scheme where she provided a free studio for a potter Hannah Murphy, and she has currently a 20% contribution to her marketing costs via Lancashire and Blackpool Tourism.

The complex as a whole is a popular visitor destination and as a workspace for artists generally – and particularly craftspeople, who find that the footfall of visitors leads to steady sales of their work.

Eden Artisans

This is a group of Artists and Craftspeople who have joined together to form a co-operative, with the objective of displaying and selling their work. Together they have been involved in a number of exhibitions and fairs throughout the years including the Appleby Fair each August.

The group all live close by Kirby Stephen in the Upper Eden Valley in Cumbria, and have a collective commitment both to keeping craft skill alive, and to producing arts and craft works of the highest quality using locally sources materials wherever possible. To further these aims Eden Artisans rent a studio space at the Farfield Mill in Sedburgh. This provides a focus for the group’s activities and an important outlet for sales.

The studio is occupied by one of the group throughout the time that Farfield Mills is open to the public. Here individual members of the group produce work, inter-act with the public visiting the Mill complex and sell the works made by members within the group – all at the same time. The geographic proximity and the personal networks amongst the individuals involved are a key component in the success of this co-operative venture – as were the easy rental arrangements offered by Farfield Mill, which requires one months rent and one months notice either way.

This means that the risks in taking a collective workspace were perceived by all members of the co-operative to be minimal and the potential benefits large. Similarly, the Mill offered considerable other attractions – the arrangements around the gallery spaces, the on-site sales arrangements, and the variable commissions charged for in-studio and in-gallery sales.

Other benefits felt by the group from this co-operative working, are also tangible. They see collective strength through co-operation, and a whole enterprise far greater than the sum of its parts. Most critically they each as individuals, value their own ability to do more than one thing at one time. Sales are rising – which appears to be in part because of their efforts and confidence as a group, and also because of the growing reputation of the Farfield Mills as a destination for the purchase of arts and crafts.

Eden Artisans are unusual at Farfield in that the are the only collective enterprise occupying a studio within the Mill complex – all the remaining fifteen studio spaces are occupied by artists working alone as individuals. Why this should be in unclear, as many of the individual artists housed in the studios work in media similar to those used within the Eden Artisans collective, and the prices charged for the works on sale are also comparable.

It could perhaps be because artists by their nature are individualistic, and often choose to work alone. But this cannot be the only reason – and most likely it is to do with co-operative tradition amongst farmers in the area, as well as previous experience around The Woolclip co-operative shop.

In terms of Eden Artisan’s own aspirations and future as a group, two issues appear important. The first is an aspiration to grow the group as a “Upper Eden Valley cluster” – or more simply, to expand it to include other artists and craftspeople from the specific place where the current membership is based.

The second, although dependent of the first, would be to consider establishing a second selling outlet. This second option would be highly dependent on location, footfall, rent and commission arrangements etc. - and it would need a tea-room on-site.

Overall the establishment of a collective enterprise – a co-operative in this instance – offers the group of individuals involved a mechanism whereby they can support each other in the production and sale of their work.

It provides a highly cost-effective vehicle for the group, which in this instance is also structured in a way that shares the costs of the core studio through shared sales commission arrangements and a collective arrangement for the stewardship of the studio space and its contents.

The model has the potential to be expanded should there be the demand to do so, and offers an innovative arrangement both to bring individual’s products into the market place but also to promote the artists and crafts people of a particular place or locality.

It is no accident that the co-operative references the valley where the members live and work, and no reason why, over time, that the operation should not be expanded to brand and sell work by other creative individuals resident in the Eden Valley. Nor is there any reason why other groups of creative could not replicate this model.

The initiative was, and remains, privately financed. Each member of the co-operative originally contributed £20 alongside their voluntary participation in a number of meetings over a three month period.

Fairfield Mill Arts and Heritage Centre

A charitable trust was established to save the building in 1993 – The Sedbergh Buildings Preservation Trust. This organisation subsequently bought the building with assistance from the John Paul Getty Jnr Trust and the Monument Trust, and converted the building to a mixed arts and heritage use, with assistance from the Northern Uplands Programme of the EU Structural Funds and English Partnerships. 

The conversion plans were changed – from an arts and heritage centre with an educational focus – when Arts Lottery funds were not approved. The amended scheme incorporated artist studios and workspaces as an alternative. The remodelled scheme, opened in 2001, comprises a mix of heritage and arts uses – with looms and heritage exhibitions on two floors plus cafe, and artists studios and exhibition areas in the remainder.

The building totals 20,000 square foot, with the heritage elements covering 8,000, and the studios another 4,000. In total there are 22 studio spaces providing accommodation for the artists and craftspeople who rent them.

Rental terms are monthly, and all-in, and the selling gallery at the heart of the building exhibits products for sale for a commission. Commissions last year paid to artists totalled £40,000. 

Alternatively the artists can sell directly from their own studios commission free. The gallery will also process credit cards sales on behalf of itself and the artists. It also houses and sells on behalf of non-residents but for a larger commission.

The proximity of the selling gallery and studio spaces compliment each other – and add to the visitor footfall. The gallery facility is managed by a separate trading company distinct from the Buildings Preservation Trust – itself now re-named The Sedbergh and District Arts and Heritage Trust.

The centre aims for a subsequent phase of development as a “Centre of Excellence for Textiles,” an initiative that would include residential studios.

Yew Tree Barn

This is a commercial operation undertaken by Wilson Reclamation Services Ltd – an architectural salvage and restoration company operating from former agricultural premises located on the main A590 Kendal-to-Barrow road at Low Newton, near Cartmel in the South Lakeland.

Wilson Reclamation Services Ltd have leased the properties for a number of years, and run a successful architectural reclamation business from this site – which includes retail and wholesale operations and store-rooms and yards open to the public.

Off-road parking is available and the nature of the business is specialist – but also attractive to drop-in visitors as well. The operation has therefore developed a steady footfall of visitors, and in consequence, over the past years the operation has diversified – first with the addition of a cafe, and then with “allied activities” such as furniture restorers.

Encouraged by a suggestion from “Made In Cumbria” plus a small grant to cover part of the capital works involved through its “Distinctly Cumbrian” Fund, the under-used areas of the buildings – which total is in excess of 12,000 square foot – have recently been converted for use as artists studios and an arts and crafts gallery.

The artist’s studio is prominently positioned near the entrance to the building and on the way to the cafe. It is now occupied by a potter, who both produces and sells work from there. The Potter, who was previously in a studio at Farfield Mill in Sedburgh, gave his reasons for moving to Yew Tree Barn as a more prominent position, better exposure for him individually, and it being nearer his home. The upper floor of the main building also houses a gallery – which sells local work, so reinforcing the Made In Cumbria mission.

Each of the operations within the building is a stand-alone legal entity renting the space they occupy – with the lease held by the operating company. Pamela Wilson, the partner of Clive Wilson, who runs the operating company, Wilson Reclamation Services, describes the developments as “a long term project”.