Who We Are
Hodge Podge Community Arts, a small community interest company established in 2022 formed with the aim of providing accessible arts opportunities for disadvantaged people. Hodge Podge Community Arts is founded and ran by Rhiannon Smith and Leora Wadler who met doing a MA in Applied Theatre at Goldsmiths University. Rhiannon is a working class Croydon local and PhD student conducting research into the Theatricalisation of Class. Leora volunteers weekly at the Croydon Refugee Day Centre helpdesk supporting asylum seekers and recent refugees to understand access their rights. We also have a regular team of freelancers and a larger pool of specialists.
What We Do
Our flagship program is Patchwork Play, providing workshops for asylum seeking children in temporary home office accommodation. We are based in a hotel in Croydon where the majority of our participants are housed. Each workshop includes pick up and drop off to the hotel and a 2 hour workshop around an arts or sports activity. First started in 2022, our workshops ran self funded every 2-3 months for 18 months, while we developed our service delivery model and worked to secure funding. In April 2024 we received full funding for Patchwork Play which allowed us to roll out weekly workshop delivery starting in June 2024, running to December 2025. Following an uplift in funding in January 2025 we also provide trips which have previously included theatre and cinema trips, upcoming trips include Oxygen Trampoline Park, Bowling, and Godstone Farm.
Founding Principles
- Children deserve a real childhood
Children displaced by forced migration have their childhood snatched away. They need space, light, culture, and self-expression to fulfil their potential.
- Participatory arts are restorative
Participatory arts support participants in taking charge of their own creativity, developing imaginative lives, and expressing themselves in their own voice.
- We commit to taking action and to continuing our own learning
We are not experts in the lives of others. But we have the capacity to support change. Asylum-seeker children need restorative arts now. Their childhood will not wait. We take action now and respond to urgent needs. We commit ourselves to centering the rights of children, to learning from asylum seekers, and to our own professional development.
