Take a look at this stunning school transformation!

Summerhill School is a secondary school located in Kingswinford, West Midlands. After pandemic lockdowns saw children learning at home for prolonged periods, the school’s Senior Leadership Team wanted to ensure that when they could safely open their doors again, that students would feel welcome, safe and inspired.

With a brief to create a sense of place and identity for each department, we began the process of bringing plain and quiet corridors to life with the power of educational murals. Having worked with educators at all levels for over 20 years, our design team really understand how to create engaging school displays that communicate information in a way that is palatable to diverse audiences.

Making an impact on the school environment

Repeatedly seeing facts and figures on school corridors that are presented in colourful and interesting ways, helps to promote ambient learning – the process of absorbing information when you may not be consciously aware of doing so. It also provides access to Cultural Capital as outlined in Ofsted’s current framework. This term relates to the understanding of key themes in a wider context than the pure subject itself, so that children develop as part of a rounded and fluid educational experience.

Sometimes, departmental teams will have a clear idea of what they want their wall mural to look like, but often teaching leads are happy to provide a list of key points to encompass and leave the creative direction to us. Whatever style your team are comfortable with, we are adept at working in ways that support your internal processes.

Working around you and your working day

Following a comprehensive site survey and working in partnership with the school’s site management agency, our proposal was submitted outlining the use of a range of materials that included, Foamex and Dibond aluminium. Our expert team are able to recommend what type of material would suit the school environment best, taking into account the wall surface and condition as well as light and heat exposure levels and location within the building.

Our experienced installation team scheduled our fitting work to suit the school’s timetable, often working evenings, weekends and during school holidays.

The feedback

The excellent feedback from students, staff, parents and visitors has been overwhelming with the school enjoying a sense of vibrancy and positive energy from their new school displays.

On visiting the school local MP, Mike Wood commented “You really do have to see these new installations to appreciate just how brilliant they are. Every corridor is now an immersive learning experience with eye-catching and inspiring designs that will no doubt motivate students to want to learn more.”

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How the power of timelines can transform your spaces!

Many of us can probably remember learning dates and events, parrot fashion, in order to pass exams during our time at school. Years later, we might still be able to recall the date of the signing of the Magna Carta or when the Battle of Hastings was fought. But do we remember much more than that? Do we remember which came first and what was the period of time between them? (Give yourself 5 points if you said The Battle of Hastings and 149 years).

In short, do we have an actual frame of reference for our knowledge?

Making an impact on your school environment

It’s one thing to know a date and quite another to understand its place and context within history. Whilst we might think of timelines as being powerful tools purely for teaching History, they are also great at showing how subjects relate to one another; how points in time that span, Geography, IT, Maths, English, Science and PE, interweave and connect.

When we visit a school and assess available space, a timeline often features in our proposal, but not always shown in the most obvious way. If you have a long stretch of straight blank corridor to work with, – great – a timeline will work wonderfully! But if you don’t have this, then don’t worry. Powerful timelines can be created to work brilliantly in functional, high traffic areas such as stairwells. This configuration can work especially well as information can be viewed directly in front of you as well as along side you, as the staircase turns between floors. Using hard wearing materials such as Foamex and Dibond Aluminium allows your school displays to feature in these areas.

The effect timelines have on your students!

The process of repeatedly seeing information and absorbing it on a subconscious level, provides another way of learning, one that students are not always aware of until the time comes to summon information. The imaginative use of colours, pictures, facts and figures, can engage learners in a different way, providing another useful tool to aid the process of teaching and boost cultural capital in your school.

Take a look at the images below to see how Summerhill School transformed their history department with the power of timelines!

So, if you would like your students to travel through time on their daily commute between lessons, give us a call and let’s find a solution perfect for your setting.

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This year it seems that the world is going bigger, bolder and earlier with Christmas decorations than ever before! We’d barely made it into November before the first twinkling lights started to appear, signalling the need for a collective mood lift as we began to recover from the tumult of the past few years. And as the trees start to go up at home, schools and businesses consider how they will bring the festive spirit to their settings.

It begs the question, what is it that we love so much about Christmas decorations?

It’s true that they can be expensive and fiddly to put up and after only a few weeks of enjoyment, we take them down again. But bringing light and colour to our environments does something to our sense of wellbeing that is hard to quantify. If only we could harness that feeling of vibrancy.

Luckily for you, we can!

This is exactly what many companies and educational establishments are waking up to. Our environments, help shape our experience and creatively decorated spaces can contribute to boosting mood, productivity and overall satisfaction levels amongst teams.

Our designs and installation techniques mean that displays can be either temporary or long term – updated seasonally or in situ for a period of years. Each design is unique to your setting with carefully considered imagery and messaging.

We design for a huge range of spaces from reception areas to breakout rooms and board rooms to canteens. We bring blank corridors to life and give unloved stairwells new purpose. We can work across a variety of surfaces including glass and will work with you to design the best solution for your particular brief.

So, as you stand back and breathe a sigh of relief that the decorations are once again in place this Christmas, consider how great it would feel to walk into a beautiful, vibrant space every day of the year. Why not drop us a line to begin your setting’s transformation…

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With business making returns to office working, it’s no wonder that after years of WFH, many employers are considering how to make their premises welcoming and attractive for staff.

Making the psychological shift from a home working to an office working mindset will take time, with the YouGov survey reporting around 44% of people polled feeling anxious about returning to office life. Whilst employers will need to adopt a multi-faceted approach to the issue, the role of environment is one that consistently presents itself as a key component in developing a positive attitude.

Our clients reaction:

‘When our clients first see the transformation, we’ve been able to effect in their workspace, their reactions are simply amazing’ says Simon Grigg, Managing Director of Think Creative and developer of the Creative Corridors concept. ‘It’s incredible how light and colour can completely invigorate an under-utilised space, creating a positive backdrop to everyday activities. Jaws generally drop! It’s my favourite part of the job’.

The effects of Wall Art!

A boost to team morale is just one of the many benefits that a Creative Corridors makeover can bring to your company. More face to face client meetings and demonstrating that your company has moved forward positively since COVID, can send a powerful signal.

‘We often propose timelines, supply chain flows or collections of key facts and figures for areas where clients may meet with customers. This allows the business’ story to be ever-present, underscored by valid, factual content.’ comments Director of Operations, Fran Grigg. ‘We have solutions for virtually every kind of surface including brick and glass, meaning we can be really innovative in our proposals. We also encourage companies to let their creative flair show with quirky ideas for fixed practical items such as fire extinguishers or light switches. We’re used to working around all kinds of obstacles and often come up with cool ideas to make a feature of them.’

The effects of colour on mood are well documented. Greens and blues are often used to create calming, tranquil environments while reds and oranges can create energy and yellow inspires optimism. Your working environment also communicates a lot about the brand values your company embraces, be these innovative and dynamic or traditional and dependable. A large part of our remit is to deliver creative solutions that capture and deliver the essence of these values, allowing them to be absorbed on a number of levels.

With the advantages of increased wellbeing, positivity and productivity, what’s not to love about a workplace makeover? To start your transformation project, drop us a line and let’s make inspiration the hallmark of your 2024.

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Here at Creative Corridors, it isn’t just school wall space that we can bring to life. Window graphics in schools are an increasingly popular choice for bringing vibrancy and colour to a learning space and can also provide practical benefits.

Thanks to advanced light filtering materials, it is possible to apply graphics to glass without making a room dark, which opens up a host of options to create educational opportunities across a broad spectrum of locations.

Branded one-way vision film (sometimes referred to as perforated film) also provides privacy, as graphics will appear solid when viewed externally, but light will still flood through into the space inside. These see-through window decals are a popular option for meeting rooms, libraries, offices, sick rooms or any space where confidentiality is a requirement. We also provide frosted window decals for when privacy is needed but graphics are not necessary.

It is even possible to create temporary window vinyls which cling via static, meaning that they can be easily moved and repositioned without leaving any sticky residue.

Vinyl window graphics can also be used to create signage and our vinyl window lettering option is a very popular solution for when fixed signage may not be an option.

It also doesn’t matter if you have a potential window space and aren’t quite sure what to do with it. Our experienced team can provide bespoke window graphics designs to suit all styles, briefs and budgets. Or perhaps you know exactly what you would like to see on your window space and simply need someone to print and install? Whatever your brief, give the Creative Corridors team a call – the education graphics experts.

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