Walkspace

Last year we began our Wandering Rocks series of walks by visiting some of the erratic boulders that travelled here from Wales on a glacier 450,000 years ago. While most of the boulders are to be found in the suburbs to the south and west of Birmingham, for this walk we’ll be heading to the city centre where an outlier erratic can be found disguised as a parish boundary marker.

In Counter-Tourism: The Handbook Crab Man introduces the concept of “beached heritage” to describe artefacts that have travelled and washed up in unlikely places. “Once you become sensitive to these ‘erratics’ you will begin to navigate a landscape from which such anomalies, large and small, repeatedly pop up.”

On this walk we’ll be visiting other examples of beached heritage including an architectural spare part repurposed as a workers’ memorial and a piece of Birmingham’s industrial heritage literally marooned on an island.

We’ll also be joined by a very special guest of the mineral variety: our very own “wandering rock”. If you fancy it then you may take a turn in carrying the guest for part of our city centre tour.

For June’s Erratic we’re trying out a classic walking game devised by Morag Rose and the Loiterer’s Resistance Movement. We’ve long been wanting to try some more experimental approaches to our public walks and the Metaphysical Treasure Hunt seems like a great way to start.

The Loiterers Resistance Movement is a Manchester based collective of urban wanderers founded in 2006 by Morag Rose. Over the years they’ve developed an array of playful techniques “to nurture an awareness of everyday space, (re)engaging with, (re)mapping and (re)enchanting the city.”

The Metaphysical Treasure Hunt is a game in which participants respond to a series of playful prompts which encourage new ways of engaging with space. The game is played as a group, with participants responding collectively and improvising the route of the walk in real time. We’ll be starting ours in Stirchley Park in Birmingham but who knows where we might end up?

These are some examples of prompts used in past LRM treasure hunts:

1. Start with something light. Look for the brightest yellow thing you can find.
2. Look down at the flotsam and jetsom. What are traces and rubbish trying to tell you?
3. Can you find evidence or rumour of the supernatural or mythological in your landscape? Do ghosts linger?

Each prompt gets around ten minutes dedicated to it before moving on to the next one. For our own Metaphysical Treasure Hunt we will source all of the prompts from the ever-growing Walkspace membership. Whether you’re familiar with Stirchley or if you’ve never visited before, you’re guaranteed to see and experience the world in new ways.

Meet in the centre of Stirchley Park (B30 2JX) at 11am, Saturday 24th June. No need to book just turn up. The route of the walk will be improvised on the day so the terrain is unknown but expect tarmac, paving, lawn and moderate inclines. Steps will be avoided. After the walk there’s the option of heading to Artefact Gallery for refreshments and to see the Walkspace 23 exhibition.

The route, distance and speed of the walk will be determined collectively based on the preferences and mobility requirements of all taking part. In general though you can expect a leisurely stroll of around 1.5 miles lasting 100 minutes. Children are welcome if accompanied by an adult. The walk shall go ahead whatever the weather.

Any questions email: walkspace.uk@gmail.com

Other Walkspace events in June

• Saturday 10th: A tour of Selly Oak’s radical history with Josh Allen
• Friday 16th: Walkspace short film night at Artefact

These events are all part of the Walkspace 23 group show which runs 3 June to 1 July at Artefact in Stirchley, Birmingham

For May’s Erratic Rachel Henaghan takes us on an early morning walk through the shadows of her past. Looking for solace in a city of trauma and austerity, this “return to station” maps a personal story of recovery and reflection after a career in the NHS.

Rachel Henaghan moved to the area thirty years ago but only became truly familiar with Birmingham after commencing her career as a paramedic.

“I had a backstage pass to the city, the privilege of accessing its hidden subterranean spaces, restricted areas, vistas from many high rises. This is costly: there are places I cannot pass without remembering, I know the stories of maintained roadside shrines and flowers, some places I would never venture to again, and I have lost the freedom to explore or travel alone.” 

The walk starts at sunrise, a liminal time when the day closes for some and begins for others. Henaghan invites you to witness the waking hour in the workplace that inspired her to re-establish her art practice. It is a journey of radical cartography, where places are defined by memory and experience.

Meet at 5:30am, Saturday 6th May on the pavement outside Highgate Fire Station, Moseley Rd, B12 0DP. Please note this is an active fire station so PLEASE DON’T BLOCK ANY OF THE ENTRANCES! The fire station is on both the number 50 and 8 bus routes, both of which operate at this hour.

The walk is about 2.7 miles long and will last around 2 hours, finishing at the Gun Quarter. The terrain will mostly be pavement and road with only minor inclines. Steps will be avoided. After the walk you are welcome to join us for breakfast or coffee in a cafe. The walk will go ahead whatever the weather.

Due to the early nature of this walk please email andyhowlett@hotmail.com to book a place so that we know how many to expect.

Rachel Henaghan was a paramedic and first responder in Birmingham with West Midlands Ambulance Service for 20 years. In 2020 she was diagnosed with autism and PTSD, and decided it was the right time to become a full-time artist. She is a resident at BOM (Birmingham Open Media) and is currently on the STEAMhouse create program researching the potential for VR to improve the health and wellbeing of frontline staff.

Robson has been compulsively walking and exploring southwest Birmingham and its rich surrounds for many years. In that time he has developed an expansive knowledge of the local topography: its winding lanes, ancient trackways and snaking valleys. A walk with Robson reveals a layered landscape of geological, animal and human interventions that form the backdrop of our suburban existence.

For our first Erratic of the year Robson will take us from Bournville Green out to Manor Farm Park and back again, peeling back the layers of the natural and human landscapes to reveal the magic of the everyday. The route takes in old pathways that once crossed farmland, a brook with multiple identities, a 400 year old hedge, a chunky piece of 1960s street infrastructure, a portal to the Elan Valley, ripples from an ice age flood and a recreation of a 14th Century Serbian Byzantine church.

Meet by the Rest House on Bournville Village Green at 11am, Sunday 26th February. This is a circular route of 3.5 miles, finishing back at the Rest House. We’ll walk at a gentle pace and aim to be back by 1pm. The terrain is pavements, roads and grass. We’ll be crossing a footbridge which has ramp access. Steps will be avoided. No Need to book, just turn up. The walk will go ahead whatever the weather.