Artists on the High Street
Artists on the High Street
Reimagining artists’ role in the future of town centres.
Partners: Cultural Transitions and RQA Creating Spaces
Year: 2026–ongoing
Location: United Kingdom
Services: Research, design thinking, convening and cultural infrastructure development
Status: Current project
Across the UK, responses to high-street decline often begin with the same question: how can we fill empty shops?
Cultural Transitions and RQA Creating Spaces are asking something more fundamental: how might artists become long-term partners in shaping the future of the high street, rather than temporary occupiers of vacant space?
Artists are frequently invited to animate town centres, but rarely included in decisions about planning, ownership, investment and long-term stewardship. Meanwhile, place leaders and landowners often lack practical models that balance the needs of artists, communities, property owners and local government.
Using a design-led approach, the project brings these perspectives together through stakeholder interviews, case-study research, site-based exploration and collaborative workshops. A design lab at the 2026 Creative Spaces Symposium will test the emerging ideas with artists, developers, local authorities, cultural organisations and landowners.
The work is intended to develop:
Practical principles for artist-led high streets
New approaches to partnership, governance and stewardship
Tools to help place leaders assess local opportunities
Potential models for affordable and sustainable creative space
A pilot concept informed by vacant high-street units in Newcastle
The aim is not another report about empty shops, but workable approaches that give artists a lasting role in the cultural, civic and economic life of town centres.
