Windrush Square cranes bring smiles in Brixton

One of the colourful cranes, as photographed by creator Steph Wetherell

Something strange happened on a sunny Saturday afternoon that put a smile of thousands of Brixton faces. Dozens of majestic looking origami cranes, painstakingly crafted from old maps, appeared suspended from a Windrush Square tree. The Blog stood and watched a while as Brixton came and went. And smiled. Small children played with lower flying birds while grown ups untangled any that had been caught out by the Autumn Breeze. Others signed a pink visitors book that hung swaying from the branches. Most just stopped, for a moment, and smiled, before making their busy way onwards up Effra Road or rushing for the bus.

The cranes are the work of Bristolian Steph Wetherell, creative mind behind The Love of It blog.  She travelled to Brixton at the weekend after a chance meeting with Chris Hardy of Up-Cycle at her previous great crane project, in Bristol last August. “It is about making people stop and break out of their daily grind,” Steph told the Brixton Blog, before Chris added: “We want people to be surprised. And to interact with their environment in a different way.” The fact that it is still there, four days later, is somewhat remarkable. The work, which Steph calls Urban Intervention, will stay up in Windrush Square for as long as it remains undamaged. It is “very much an exercise in trust,” according to its creator. The fact that it is still there is somewhat remarkable.

Photo gallery: Urban Intervention in Windrush Square, Brixton. All photos by Steph Wetherell

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