Ready, set, draw – Knebworth care home residents take part in worldwide art festival

Home news

Dec 07, 2020

Residents at a care home in Knebworth picked up their pencils and went back to the drawing board for The Big Draw Festival 2020.

Care UK’s Knebworth, on London Road, celebrated all things nature by creating works of art around this year’s theme, ‘A Climate of Change’.  

As part of their event, residents and team members virtually joined forces with children from Knebworth Primary School to create a collaborative piece of art.

Residents also joined illustrator and author Gary Andrews for an exclusive live drawing workshop centred around endangered animals, organised virtually in partnership with The Big Draw.

As part of the session, residents and team members were able to watch Gary, ambassador for The Big Draw and a former Disney illustrator, as he drew a variety of endangered animals, including koalas, polar bears, puffins and sea turtles, while he explained various drawing techniques, such as shading and under-drawings. At the end of the session, residents were invited to ask questions and submit requests.

Launched in 2000 as part of the ‘Campaign for Drawing’, the month-long Big Draw Festival promotes drawing as a tool for learning, expression and invention, and has encouraged over four million people to get arty since its inception. ‘A Climate of Change’, this year’s theme, focused on the relationship between people and their environment, and offered a great opportunity for older people to reminisce about their favourite nature spots, as well as trips to the great outdoors in their younger years, and how our focus looking after our planet has changed in recent years. 

Vera Moreira-Henocq, Home Manager at Knebworth, said: “We had a great time taking part in The Big Draw again this year, and it was a wonderful opportunity to put our creativity to the test.

“Art and intergenerational activities are a huge part of life here at Knebworth, and even though we may have been unable to meet in person, it was fantastic to work with the children at Knebworth Primary School on a collaborative piece of artwork. As well as being a great way to develop our artistic skills, intergenerational activities area wonderful way to improve wellbeing and provide older people with a sense of purpose.”

After a successful participation in the Big Draw Festival last year, Care UK renewed its partnership in 2020, becoming the main health and social care partner and leading the way in changing perceptions of life in a care home by promoting activity-based care and encouraging other care homes to follow suit. Across the country, more than 70 homes have been getting arty and working with their local communities virtually to create works of art around the theme ‘A Climate of Change’.

Knebworth delivers a full range of residential care for older people, including short-term respite care, nursing care and specialist care for people living with Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia.

For more information on Knebworth, please call Customer Relations Manager Paula Brown, on 01438 893411, or email  paula.brown@careuk.com.   

To find out more about Care UK’s partnership with the Big Draw, and for more top tips on how you and your loved ones can get involved at home, visit careuk.com/care-homes/bigdraw

To find out more about the Big Draw festival, please go to thebigdraw.org