With the outbreak of Covid-19 (Coronavirus) having resulted in the closure of businesses including our own, we’re all working on creative ways of adapting to the situation.
At the heart of the Belgrade’s ethos is being a creative hub for the community, so our team felt strongly that our response to the current situation should involve strengthening our local partnerships and helping to support other people who have been affected. It’s with this in mind that this weekend, we’re introducing Saturday Shout Outs.
Saturday Shout Outs: How it Works
While our building remains closed, we’ll be using our Saturdays not to talk about the work the Belgrade is doing, but to highlight ome of the other fantastic work happening across Coventry and Warwickshire.
Each weekend, we’ll be inviting local artists, organisations and creative businesses to use the hashtag #SaturdayShoutOut to talk about the work they’re doing on social media, and we’ll retweet and share posts to our own accounts.
In addition this, we’ll also have a planned weekly spotlight on one or two events and activities that we’re particularly excited about, creating videos, blog posts or podcasts to give them an extra boost.
If you’ve got an exciting project planned that you think could be one of our featured Saturday Shout Outs, please drop an email with the details to hkincaid@belgrade.co.uk, or send a direct message on Twitter to @BelgradeHeather.
This weekend, our featured project is Fargo Village’s Online Spring Makers’ Market.
Fargo Village – Online Spring Makers’ Market
Coventry’s creative quarter Fargo Village is well known for its arts and craft markets, and one of the most popular of these is its annual Spring Makers’ Market.
Unfortunately, due to the UK-wide lockdown, the market due to take place this weekend was called off at short-notice – but the ever-resourceful Fargo team were able to respond quickly by moving their market online.
At 11am today (Saturday 28 March), a web page dedicated to the Spring Makers’ Market will go live, where you can browse a range of beautiful hand-made products and order items to be delivered to your doorstep – a great way of cheering yourself up in these uncertain times or spreading some love with a gift for a friend or relative you’re unable to visit.
The event will run across Saturday and Sunday, and before the page went live, we caught up with Events Manager Lucy Thompstone to find out more.
“The process of putting it online was a bit of an experiment and we’re still learning as we go a little bit, but so far, so good,” she explained. “The idea came from Pedal UK which is a great company we work with that supports a lot of independent makers and also independent markets, and they hosted an online market about three weeks ago.
“When we found out that we weren’t going to be able to host our Spring Makers’ Market in person, we were really sad and didn’t want to lose it because it is one of our favourite events of the year. So we took a bit of inspiration from Pedal, we got onto our web designers and got a page put together really quickly.
“We started off by creating a page just for our tenants, which is live now. You can go onto our website for a little flavour of Fargo: you can browse through all of the Fargo businesses that currently have online shops.
“Then we used that template to create a page especially for the market, and we have been working on that with our makers and designers, who have all been really good and really adapted to the challenge. A lot of them have sent through little videos so that we’ll be able to share those over the weekend and you can get an insight into how they work. So lots of experimentation, lots of creativity, but that’s what Fargo does best!”
“I know a few people have asked about postage and how it might be affected given the current situation. The honest answer is, we’re not sure, but as far as we know, Royal Mail and delivery couriers are all working as normal – in fact they’re working really hard, so big thanks to those guys.”
“The last thing I’d say from Fargo is just a big thank you for supporting us. Things like the Spring Makers’ Market online are all a bit of an experiment – we’re all just adapting to this new situation, but the support that we’ve had online so far ahead of the event has been overwhelming, and we’re really excited to see how this weekend goes.
“Just remember, a purchase online this weekend might be quite small to you, but to the independent maker on the other end, it’s a really big deal, especially in these uncertain times. So from all of the Fargo team and all of our makers, a massive thank you, and hopefully we’ll see you all this weekend!”
Fargo Village’s Online Spring Makers Market goes live from 11am on Saturday 28 March, and runs until Sunday 29 March. Visit the Fargo Village website to find out more.