Braziers Park and the Art of Grabbing Hope
Text by Sophy Cullington
Ever since being appointed as Education Coordinator at Braziers Park, it has been important to me to build a programme of events that genuinely reflects our community's ethos of conscious co-existence. That means honouring our history, but it also means being intentional about how Braziers situates itself within a current broader political movement – one pushing back against the tide of individualism and towards a more community-oriented way of thinking, being and living alongside one another. For me, understanding ourselves as part of a wider whole, rather than as an isolated entity, is central to grasping the role projects like ours can play in the shift towards a more socially just, ecologically sustainable and genuinely democratic future.
What I felt strongly about was fostering connection and collaboration with like-minded organisations, whose stories and approaches we could hear and learn from, whilst also having the opportunity to share our own. It was through this intention that I came across Humanity Project, an organisation working to cultivate assembly culture, a new kind of people-led politics that gives communities real control over what matters to them where they live, built on the radically simple act of listening to one another. When I first discovered and reached out to them, it quickly became clear that their work resonated deeply with the culture of group process and collective decision-making already alive on a micro-scale within our community here at Braziers. The difference was that they were working with organisations across the UK to implement this on a far wider scale. I was inspired by the reach of their approach, and by their commitment to spreading hope, joy and unity as a genuine antidote to the polarisation of our current political climate. It felt natural to offer Braziers as a venue for them to host a Popular Assembly – and so together we began planning what would become Grabbing Hope, a weekend aimed at uniting partners, community members and organisers from across the country to learn more about assembly culture together.
Grabbing Hope took place February 20th-22nd 2026, bringing together around 30 organisers from across the UK and beyond – from Haringey to Manchester, Luton to Shropshire, Brixton to Belgium – people working across food, race, climate, housing and local democracy. On the Saturday, we began with an introduction to assembly culture, followed by a session titled ‘Co-Governance: The North Star to Achieve Genuine Collaborative Power’, both of which were designed to deepen our skills in facilitation, listening and deliberation. As a respite after the day’s workshops, we spent the Saturday evening recording an episode of the Good Neighbours podcast – a deliberately lighter, more celebratory moment before the deeper work of the People's Assembly the following day.
Good Neighbours is a podcast created by The Fête of Britain, a nationwide rolling festival with a simple but powerful idea: bring people together, make it a party and make it matter. They weave culture together with the causes that need our attention, creating space where we can speak honestly about what's broken, celebrate what's working, share food and shine a light on the unsung heroes already building a better way to live. Hosted by the brilliant Clare Farrell and Jessie-Lu Flynn, the podcast embodies exactly that spirit. The episode featured voices from some truly inspiring projects; among them the Haringey Community Food Network, Ridge Hill Together and Oswestry Climate Action Hub. I spoke on the podcast alongside Alex Rudgalvis (Braziers Park's Kitchen-Garden Link), about our community here at Braziers. We touched on Braziers' history as an experiment in community and collective living, what day-to-day community life actually looks and feels like, and what deep listening means to us in practice. I also talked about the role that Soul, Soil and Society plays in our education programme – the thread that connects inner life, the land and how we organise ourselves together.
On Sunday, we began the day with a short Unitarian gathering from the radically inclusive, non-religious church, before splitting into teams to plan the venue, topic and facilitation structure for the People’s Assembly taking place that afternoon. During the assembly itself, we gathering in regional groups and discussed how we might each host screenings of a new film from the National Emergency Briefing (see here), a public information initiative ensuring the UK is fully briefed on the climate and nature crisis. We explored where to host screenings, which audiences to reach, how to diversify those audiences, and how to ensure the screenings inspired people to act, rather than adding to the climate anxiety and feelings of helplessness that can so easily take hold when we confront the scale of ecological devastation we are facing.
What the Humanity Project is building feels like a practical, hopeful response to the disillusionment so many of us feel with conventional politics. Popular Assemblies aren't a distant ideal, but rather a model for participatory, people-led democracy that starts exactly where you live. It's a conviction Braziers has held for over seventy-five years: that community, shared culture and collective decision-making are integral to our ability to consciously coexist. The weekend was proof of how joyful, celebratory and genuinely collaborative this different kind of politics can be. I am enormously grateful to the team at the Humanity Project and Community Organisers for making this weekend what it was – and especially to Ruth Rogers, whose instrumental role and shared vision made the collaboration so successful.
Hope isn't something we wait for – it's something we organise! If this has piqued your interest, we're delighted to say that Braziers Park and the Humanity Project will be coming together to run another gathering in 2027. More details to follow – we hope to see you there.
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To hear Sophy Cullington and Alex Rudgalvis on Good Neighbours, head to timestamp 14:17–23:39: watch the full episode here