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

Home news

Dec 07, 2020

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

Care UK’s Field Lodge, 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 drew pictures based around their visions of climate change, which prompted discussions around how our environment has changed over the past decade.

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, focuses on the relationship between people and their environment, and offers 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. 

Linda Martinez, Home Manager at Field Lodge, said: “We loved taking part in The Big Draw Festival for a second year – and although things were a bit different this year, it was a great opportunity to get our creative juices flowing.

“Here at Field Lodge, we believe in the power of activity-based care, and drawing is the perfect example of how we can put this into practice, as it is an incredibly accessible activity that people of all ages can enjoy. This year’s theme gave us a lot to think about, and it was great to hear residents’ favourite nature-related anecdotes and views on how things have changed since they were young.

“We can’t wait to display the final masterpieces in the home and our Facebook page for everyone to see.”

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’.

Field Lodge is a modern purpose-built care home providing full-time residential, nursing, and dementia care, as well as short-term respite care. Designed to enable residents to live enjoyable and fulfilling lives, the care home has a choice of lounges and dining rooms, along with facilities such as an activity room, cinema and hair salon.

To find out more about Field Lodge, please call Customer Relations Manager, Jo Molloy-Cruden on 01480 877638, or email johan.molloy-cruden@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