Leeds College of Art is a member of GIDE (Group for International Design Education) which is an exciting opportunity, which involves students within higher education and from different institutions to meet and work together that is beneficial to their learning and experience as students studying within art and design.
Each year the institutions the students engage in an international project that has a theme for them to explore and develop. Furthermore, the staff and students work in mixed groups, which gives them the chance to meet students and tutors from different countries. The week also involves of an exhibition where a selection of work, from the different institutions, is presented to the public.
This year, Leeds hosted the event with students coming from Dundee, Italy, Switzerland, China, Slovenia, Belgium and Germany.
DAY 1
On the first day, we welcomed the students to Leeds College of Art at The Carriageworks in Millennium Square. Here, we introduced the chosen theme for this year’s event.
“Welcome In”
The chosen theme for this year entered around the idea of us developing ways to make a creative space more exciting and therefore, ‘welcome in’ the public. The Old Red Bus Station, Inkwell, Live Arts Bisto and the Arts Hostel were the spaces that were a part of the project.
After the presentation, we gathered in our groups and were given an ice breaker challenge. This was a really engaging and enjoyable activity that allowed us to dress our tutors up, within our group, in an amusing way. We were given a bag of materials and the theme of “connection”.
In the afternoon, my group and I went to visit The Old Red Bus Station, which was the space that my group and I would be working on. The visit gave us a feel of the space and we were able to speak to one of the people working behind it, who gave us an insight into the plans that T.O.R.B.S had.
This was taken from the exterior of the building, where it has a distinctive round front.
DAY 2
On the second day, we were based down in the studio theatre developing our ideas. I had an orthodontist appointment that morning, so unfortunately, I missed most of the development process within my group. However, they were able to fill me in and bring me up to speed.
Our idea was based around the idea of using a QR code and presenting them in bus shelters in Leeds. People would then scan these through their phones and tablets and then it will come up with an interactive map that will direct them from that stop to the bus station. As well as that, it will also come up with upcoming listings of events that would be taking place at the venue.
Furthermore, we experimented with the position of the code (see below).
We used notebooks and materials and printed two different parts of the code in different sizes. Through this experiment, our aim was test with the sizing and positioning of the code if it was to appear three-dimensional in the shelter instead of a flat two- dimensional image.
Having carried out this test, it was successful.
That evening, it was the GIDE banner exhibition. This was a selection of banners from each institution which were exhibited at The Old Red Bus Station. Upon arrival, we were given stickers where we could mark our favourite banners from across the institutions.
Day 3
This was another really intense day, even more so because we were presenting our ideas so we had to finalise our work. In our idea, we also photoshopped a red spot over the door of The Old Red Bus Station, this would mark the building and therefore inform the individual of their arrival to the building.
We also did some more experiments and tested the appearance of the QR code in the shelter just across from the college.
We made life-size prototypes to experiment how they would work within the shelter, where we then photographed them in the positions.
That evening, we held a party at The Old Red Bus Station. This was to mark the end of an enjoyable week as
Evie Martin 