Building on last year’s Festive Windows project, Bermondsey’s businesses (through their BID) & Big Local Works are inviting schools, nurseries, artists, community groups and local organisations to help transform the neighbourhood into one giant public gallery this Christmas.
(If you’d like to take part, please get in touch using the email at the bottom of this page.)
Imagine walking down Southwark Park Road on a cold December evening.
The Christmas lights are on.
People are heading home from work.
Others are meeting friends for dinner.
In the window of a local café, a single framed drawing hangs beneath a small gallery label.
The Flying Christmas Cat
Amelia, Age 6
Felt tip pen on paper
Beneath it, a short exhibition text reads:
“In this ambitious work, the artist explores themes of adventure, companionship and seasonal optimism. The decision to place the cat above the Earth rather than upon it suggests a rejection of conventional limitations and a belief that curiosity should always take precedence over practicality.”
You smile.
Not because it is ridiculous.
Because it is oddly true.
You look at the drawing again.
The cat really does look determined.
The rocket really does look joyful.
Suddenly you’re spending more time looking at a child’s drawing than you normally would.
That is the point.
The Art of Looking
Every December, children’s drawings appear on classroom walls, fridge doors and kitchen noticeboards across the country.
They are loved.
Displayed for a few weeks.
Then quietly packed away.
But what if we treated them differently?
What if we displayed them with the same care, respect and attention normally reserved for works hanging in major galleries and museums?
This year, Bermondsey’s businesses are exploring an idea that would transform shop windows across the neighbourhood into a distributed public gallery of children’s artwork—festive and non-festive alike.
Local schools, nurseries and community groups will invite children to create drawings.
Rather than simply pinning them in windows, each artwork will be professionally presented and accompanied by a thoughtful interpretation written by a local artist, writer, architect, designer, maker or creative practitioner.
The role of the adult is not to explain the drawing.
It is to spend time with it.
To notice things.
To take the child seriously.
The interpretations will be thoughtful, generous and occasionally playful.
The aim is not to parody the art world.
The aim is to genuinely elevate the work.
Because children create some of the most original art in our communities.
Free from many of the assumptions adults accumulate over time, they approach creativity with curiosity, confidence and experimentation.
They are less concerned with whether something is technically correct and more interested in whether something is exciting, funny or surprising.
Yet we rarely stop to look closely at what they create.
A Different Kind of Attention
We live in an age of scrolling.
Thousands of images pass in front of us every day.
Most receive less than a second of our attention before disappearing forever.
This exhibition asks a very different question.
What happens when we choose to spend five minutes looking at one drawing instead of half a second looking at five hundred?
Not because it is famous.
Not because it is expensive.
Simply because somebody made it.
The project asks a simple question.
What changes when we decide something deserves our attention?
Bermondsey Becomes the Gallery
Imagine a family walking through Bermondsey on a Saturday afternoon, map in hand, following an art trail from window to window.
At one stop, a seven-year-old proudly points to her drawing in the window of a local bakery.
At another, grandparents stop to read an exhibition text outside a pub.
Further along the route, somebody who came out to buy coffee finds themselves studying a drawing of a snowman with twelve arms and discussing it with a complete stranger.
The exhibition would not take place inside a gallery.
Bermondsey would become the gallery.
Cafés, restaurants, workshops, offices, pubs and independent businesses would each host artworks in their windows, creating a festive trail that encourages residents and visitors to explore the neighbourhood while celebrating the creativity already present within it.
World Peace and Future Generations
Alongside the children’s exhibition, a number of established artists will be invited to contribute new work responding to a shared theme:
World Peace and Future Generations.
Rather than exhibiting separately, these works will be woven throughout the trail, sitting naturally alongside the children’s drawings.
Visitors might encounter a professional painter between two nursery artworks.
A sculptor’s drawing opposite a Year Three masterpiece.
An illustrator responding to many of the same hopes, fears and dreams expressed by the children themselves.
The intention is not to compare one with the other.
It is to place them into conversation.
The children’s work remains at the heart of the exhibition.
The professional artists become fellow participants, reminding us that creativity does not stop when childhood ends—and that imagining a better future is something every generation shares.
The Artists Become the Critics
One of the exhibition’s most unusual ideas is that local artists are invited not only to exhibit, but also to become critics.
Each exhibition label will be written by someone from Bermondsey’s creative community.
A ceramicist.
An architect.
A designer.
A photographer.
A poet.
A furniture maker.
A painter.
Not to judge.
But to look carefully.
Every interpretation becomes an act of generosity.
An invitation to spend another minute with a drawing that might otherwise have been passed without a second glance.
In doing so, the exhibition quietly introduces visitors to the extraordinary creative community that already exists in Bermondsey.
The Young Curator’s Passport
To encourage families to explore the exhibition, every participating child will receive a Young Curator’s Passport.
Part gallery guide.
Part treasure hunt.
Part keepsake.
The passport will include a map of participating venues, featured artworks and space to collect unique exhibition stamps along the route.
A bakery might have a gingerbread stamp.
A café a flying reindeer.
A workshop a Christmas robot.
Every venue becomes another discovery.
The passport also includes space for children to become curators themselves.
My favourite artwork…
The artwork that surprised me most…
Something I noticed…
It is not about collecting stamps for a prize.
It is about encouraging children—and adults—to look more closely.
Children who complete part or all of the trail will receive an Official Young Curator Certificate, recognising the time they have spent exploring, observing and engaging with the exhibition.
After all, if the children are the artists, perhaps the visitors should become the curators.
A Collective Project
This is exactly the kind of project Bermondsey’s businesses can achieve by working together through their Business Improvement District, alongside local charity Big Local Works.
A BID allows local businesses to pool resources and invest collectively in the area they share.
No single business could turn an entire neighbourhood into a gallery.
Together, they can.
Together, they can provide the windows, partnerships, artists, schools, volunteers and coordination needed to create something genuinely special.
The result is a project that supports local businesses, celebrates local children, showcases Bermondsey’s creative community and creates moments of surprise and delight throughout the festive season.
A drawing that might otherwise spend a few weeks on a classroom wall becomes a public artwork.
A shop window becomes a gallery.
A local artist becomes a critic.
A child becomes an exhibiting artist.
Because Attention Matters
Children are often told to pay attention.
This exhibition quietly asks adults to do the same.
Because perhaps the rarest gift we can give another person is not praise.
It is our attention.
Especially when they are young enough to believe that what they make matters.
Bermondsey has always been a place that makes things.
This Christmas, it becomes a place that notices them too.
Get involved
We’re looking for schools, nurseries, artists, creative practitioners, businesses and community groups who would like to take part.
If you’d like to exhibit artwork, write exhibition interpretations, host a window or become part of the trail, we’d love to hear from you.
events@bluebermondsey.co.uk Ben@Bermondsey.London
UPDATE: Potential future of the project beyond Christmas
What if the Gallery Never Closed?
One of the most exciting things about the Festive Windows project is that it has prompted an unexpected question.
What if we didn’t take it down?
This Christmas, Bermondsey’s shop windows will become a gallery, displaying children’s artwork alongside pieces by professional artists, transforming ordinary walks down the high street into something a little more magical.
But once the decorations come down…
…the gallery itself could remain.
The frames and exhibition spaces could stay exactly where they are, ready for a new exhibition every quarter.
Instead of creating one temporary art trail each December, Bermondsey could become home to a permanent, ever-changing public gallery.
One month could showcase local photographers documenting everyday life in SE16.
The next could celebrate illustrations by local schools.
Another might feature architecture students imagining the future of London’s neighbourhoods.
There could be exhibitions exploring Bermondsey’s industrial heritage, local wildlife, food, music, migration, community stories or the creativity of people who simply enjoy making things.
Professional artists could exhibit alongside emerging talent.
Community groups could curate their own exhibitions.
Local history societies could tell stories through photographs and artefacts.
There would always be something new to discover.
Unlike a traditional gallery, there would be no admission charge and no opening hours.
The exhibition would simply exist within the neighbourhood itself.
You might discover a new artist while collecting your morning coffee.
Pause outside a bakery on your way to work.
Or find yourself taking a different route home because you’ve heard a new exhibition has just opened in the windows of your local shops.
For participating businesses, it creates another reason for people to visit the high street, encouraging visitors to slow down, explore and discover independent businesses they may never have noticed before.
For artists, it offers an exhibition space unlike any other in London.
And for Bermondsey, it creates something that feels distinctly our own.
The infrastructure is already there.
The shop windows already exist.
The community already exists.
Perhaps all we’re really doing is looking at them differently.
We’re still focused on delivering a fantastic Festive Windows exhibition this Christmas.
But if the project captures people’s imagination in the way we hope it will, perhaps Christmas won’t be the end of the story.
Perhaps it will simply be the opening exhibition.
