Join Ruth Beale and Amy Feneck from the Alternative School of Economics, as they dream up something new — a modular, mobile Reading Room for Peterborough — and they invite you to be part of it.  

Together we’ll reimagine what a reading room could be – a structure that can hold books and be a space for meaningful conversations. We need your help to make it welcoming, inviting, and something you’d like to use!  

During the workshop we’ll use screen printing and block printing techniques to transform recycled fabric into material for Metal’s new Reading Room structure, as well as imagery inspired by Peterborough, its histories, stories and community spaces. 

No experience necessary, just curiosity and a willingness to experiment! 

About Dream Space 

This workshop is part of our Dream Space, which will breathe new life into an empty shop unit in the corner of Queensgate, transforming it into a vibrant community hub for reading, reflection, and creative exchange in the heart of Peterborough.  At the centre of Dream Space is our Pop-Up Reading Room – a place where ideas are cooked up, books are shared, and conversations spark. This is one event of a packed programme of events and workshops and the opportunity to co-design a new pop-up reading room structure to live on beyond the project. 

You can find out more about Dream Space here.  

About The Alternative School of Economics  

The Alternative School of Economics is a collaboration between artists Ruth Beale and Amy Feneck that questions dominant economic systems through collective self-education. Working with communities, they explore global political issues in relation to lived experience and use feminist and alternative economics as forms of resistance. A selection of books from their projects Rabbits Road Institute Library (2016-) and The Neoliberal Imagination (2023) can be found on the shelves.  

About ReCollective  

ReCollective are a diverse group of designers, environmental activists, makers and mavericks who work together to create systemic changes around attitudes towards ‘waste’ materials. They divert material away from waste streams, often from creative industries like film and theatre, and embedding it into buildings and structures for communities. 

Image credit: The Alternative School of Economics & At the Library