Artist Development Workshop – WorkWell: Embedding Welfare into your Creative Practice

This workshop helps creative teams build safe, inclusive, and collaborative working environments from the very start of a project. It offers practical tools and strategies to support wellbeing, strengthen relationships, and create rehearsal processes that prioritise individual and collective care. Through interactive exercises, participants will develop skills for managing stress, navigating conflict, and staying motivated – while keeping accessibility, collaboration and psychological safety at the centre.

The session also introduces a Welfare Toolkit – a resource for self-producing artists to embed welfare provisions early in their process. It includes guidance on writing care into funding bids, planning for accessibility, and building sustainable, supportive working practices. By making welfare a core part of creative planning, artists can create more resilient, joyful, and productive environments for everyone involved.

PlayWell works with people from local communities to global companies to support and promote positive health and wellbeing. Their focus is on keeping people well through playful and engaging programmes, including company-wide training, interactive workshops, and creative welfare consultancy. They help create sustainable frameworks for health and happiness – encouraging everyone to work well, play well, and stay well.

Lauren, founder of PlayWell, is a jolly-anxious clown, welfare consultant, and Jewish theatremaker from Liverpool. She trained in clown with Philippe Gaulier and Aitor Basauri of Spymonkey. Her solo work includes Broigus, SURPRISE!, and Get Ready with Me, and she has performed with companies such as Tall Stories, Theatre by the Lake, and the Dukes Theatre, and at venues including the Vaudeville Theatre, Sydney Opera House, and Liverpool Everyman.