A crowd of people in front of corporate premises.

Phase one of Cultivator worked with over 600 creative businesses and organisations. The University supported creative practitioners through three key activities.

Professional Peer Support Network (PPSN)
The purpose of the PPSN was to enhance growth and development within creative businesses and organisations in Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly. We did this by providing access to academic experts from the University and also external experts from across the UK鈥檚 creative industries sector. 

The PPSN involved a series of one-to-one clinics, visits to practitioners' workplaces, networking opportunities and various events and meetings. 

Annual Conference
The conference brought together various creative practitioners over two consecutive days to increase their productivity and competitiveness. The event involved key speakers and leaders bringing new ideas in areas such as increasing revenue, marketing opportunities, best practice and Knowledge Exchange.

Showcasing
This involved giving practitioners the opportunity to showcase their business at key regional or national events such as London Design Fair, The Great Escape, Port Eliot Festival, Celtic Media Festival and British Museum Conference. The showcasing element of the programme gave practitioners the opportunity to increase awareness of Cornwall鈥檚 creative industries as well as networking with industry professionals.

Phase One Projects

The Great Escape

The Great Escape Festival is a three day globally renowned festival for emerging musicians across the UK and Europe. 

We took four emerging acts to the festival and offered them the opportunity to be a part of the fringe element of the festival and provided them with tickets to the convention part of the festival, which included key networking and workshop opportunities. 

The four acts showcased were singer songwriters, and , and bands including Milo Gore, and .

鈥淪eeing everyone together at the Cornish showcase was pretty special; looking back and being like, 鈥榳ow, we did that!鈥欌 鈥揝howcase performer

Milo Great Escape, image courtesy of Ronan
Cultivator at London Design Fair

London Design Fair

We partnered with high-end craft magazine Hole & Corner who curated the British Craft Pavilion at the London Design Fair and were able to secure seven stands for Cornish makers. The aim was to raise the profile of Cornish makers nationally and internationally and create selling opportunities for them, and to launch the Design Frontier initiative.

We gave seven makers the opportunity to exhibit at the London Design Fair, these were: furniture makers ; ceramicists ; ceramicist ; furniture and objects d鈥檃rt maker ; silversmith ; the ; and furniture maker

The makers exhibited under the collective title, Design Frontier, and as part of the British Craft Pavilion, curated by .

Celtic Media Festival

The Celtic Media Festival is an annual three day event that promotes the languages and cultures of the Celtic regions in media. The event combines a conference of seminars and master classes across all the main content genres in TV, radio film and digital media. 

We took eight film-makers from Cornwall to the festival, varying in experience from student to highly accomplished. 

The eight film-makers who attended the festival were: , David Morris from , Florence Brown, , , , and .

鈥淚t was brilliant鈥攋ust what the industry in Cornwall needs. Please do it again!鈥 鈥 Celtic Media Festival attendee

Conference - image courtesy of Getty Images