Take a look the FWFC project archive below.
The vast majority of this work was generated voluntarily by women managing full time responsibilities, jobs and child-rearing who dedicated their time, skills and energy to the movement for women’s equality.
Thank you to every person and organisation who supported our work from 2017 – 2023 and gave us their help, resources, space, expertise and labour.
BACK UP
FWFC supported local groups and people already doing effective work for women in the region, offering our time, voices and skills to help with their work. Pooling our skills, energy and networks, we produced innovative fundraisers that generated money for essential women’s services and raised awareness of the societal inequalities facing women.
TALK AIN’T CHEAP (2018) at Centrala in Digbeth, Birmingham, raised funds for The Haven refuge’s telephone interpretation service, a vitally important service supporting non-English speaking women to access domestic abuse support. The event sold TALK AIN’T CHEAP t-shirts and prints by Sarah Taylor Silverwood, limited edition brooches and hand printed tote bags, alongside artwork donated by artists in the city. It featured film screenings and an evening of performance, spoken word and music from Who’s That Girl, Nafeesa Hamid, Liz Ord, Emily Warner and Poppy Mabel.
EMPOWER BAB was our 2020 lockdown fundraiser for Baobab Women’s Project, a West Midlands refugee and asylum seeker women’s advocacy project, working in solidarity with others for positive change. They focus on undocumented, asylum seeking and newly granted refugee women’s issues, particularly supporting women affected by gender-based violence and trafficking. Our EMPOWER BAB shop sold small, original, affordable artworks made and donated by over 50 people responding to the word ’empower’, including women supported by Baobab.
Our SKILLS FOR GROWTH 2023 fundraiser raised money for Birmingham & Solihull Women’s Aid. We ran an online shop that sold affordable, limited edition artwork, tea towels, tote bags and t-shirts, designed by artist Sarah Taylor Silverwood and produced in Birmingham by Sofia Niazi and Do Make Say Ink. Inspired by the women working for BSWA, SKILLS FOR GROWTH encouraged everyone to make their people skills work for change.
ELEVATE
FWFC linked into a UK-wide network of feminists campaigning nationally, strengthening their messages by protesting, promoting, petitioning and supporting them through our own networks and contacts.
FWFC at the Women’s Strike 2018, Reclaim the Night 2019 and Pregnant Then Screwed March of the Mummies protest, 2022. FWFC at the Women’s Strike featured in the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery’s Women Power Protest exhibition zine designed by Kerry Leslie, in a stunning piece by Sarah Taylor Silverwood.
ORGANISE
Collectively identifying the gaps in provision facing women and girls in the West Midlands, we put our ideas, experience and energy to use and aimed to deliver positive solutions that can make a difference. Forging partnerships with organisations, we produced projects that raised awareness of feminist issues and provided empowering, creative opportunities for people.
As part of Multistory‘s UN Women End Violence Against Women 16 Days of Activism 2017 project, we ran painting and block printing feminist slogan workshops for the public. The event raised awareness about domestic abuse through a designated market stall on West Bromwich market where the workshops took place.
Just before lockdown in 2020, FWFC ran a feminist slogan & tote bag making workshop for Barber Lates at the Barber Institute Birmingham, for students and the public. The workshop included an introduction to feminist protest signs and slogans through history and a guide to generating your own message.
With support from an Arts Council England grant, we produced This isn’t what love should feel like, a domestic abuse awareness raising zine and digital campaign, with new writing, artwork and contributions by Birmingham & Solihull Women’s Aid (BSWA), writer Nafeesa Hamid, artist Sarah Taylor Silverwood and creative producer Katy Sadler. Sarah and Katy also ran creative sessions for women in refuge with artist Carolyn Morton and ceramics collective Modern Clay.
Feminists Work for Change 