Worcestershire County Council, supported by the Design Council’s Service Transformation Programme, commissioned a series of co-design workshops. The brief was to explore and develop ideas to help vulnerable young people back into work and education through the use of local community spaces.

Working with architectural design practice Studio TILT, three one-day workshops were delivered in Redditch, Kidderminster and Worcester YMCA centres. All participants were 16-19 years old and current YMCA residents. Many had previously experienced homelessness. Each local team had the opportunity to pitch for a prize of £2500 to implement their ideas.

The workshop format focused on prioritising user needs, mapping available resources, modelling the space, generating ideas for new uses and action planning next steps.  The workshops generated clear proposals for new uses of three local YMCA spaces. These were:

1. Turning a turned disused shower block into an emergency crash-pad for homeless children.
2. An employment resource centre within a YMCA common room offering drop-in learning and a breakfast club with mentors.
3. A flexible, multi-use community centre offering life skills, money management, ICT courses and cinema nights.

As a result each local team were engaged and committed to making changes within their local community. Each team selected a project lead and we created an action plan and budget with the young people to present to Worcestershire County Council. The three teams successfully secured the funding and further support to take their ideas forwards.