Studio Update

This pandemic has highlighted just how vital our work is, but it’s not reaching enough people.

We’ve been a bit quiet here at Studio Meineck since the pandemic hit. We are feeling the heavy weight of personal crisis in ourselves and our loved ones, as well as the wider crisis in our society, especially felt by so many of the groups we work with. This has meant that operating with our tiny team – there’s just two of us most of the time – has been harder than ever.

Our work is focused on so many areas where people have been disproportionately impacted by Covid-19. The effect on care homes especially has not been surprising, but has still been shocking. Our care homes are full of some of the most dedicated carers in our society and despite the systems that failed them they’ve continued to care for vulnerable older people when their families are unable to reach them.

We’ve also seen those at home either as a family member, carer or someone dealing with their own health massively affected. We know the impact a product like Music Memory Box could have had for people during lockdown and following the reopening of our manufacturing partners we’re working hard to get it made and to the people who need it.

The other project we’ve been working on in lockdown is with men from Second Step’s the Hope Project around monitoring mental health. Following some great in person workshops we moved to phone calls and video meetings to keep the project going. This is another product we know could’ve helped people during lockdown, with existing mental ill health deteriorating and people being more isolated from their support networks. We hope it will be part of the help on offer as people readjust back into a world with and/or without Covid-19.

We’ve been doing socially engaged work since 2016 (and Chloe before that), specialising in co-creating tools with isolated communities, putting them right at the centre of designing solutions to their own challenges. The pandemic has hit us hard both personally and in terms of the impact we wish we were able to make. We miss working with people, building relationships and learning from each other. 

We want to have a greater social impact with what we do and so we’re taking some time to think about what that studio might need to look like.

Ideas on a postcard please. 

And thanks for sticking with us.

– Chloe and Jess