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Our Space

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Our Space is a creative programme supporting adults facing multiple and complex challenges. It provides experiential interventions and transformative experiences that address issues surrounding mental health and well-being, community integration, resilience, and hope.

The programme provides individuals with free, regular and meaningful activity that contributes to recovery and rehabilitation.

Interested in finding out more?

Please call or text 07732 499859 or email ourspace@theatreroyal.com.

To register your interest/make a referral please click on the button below.

Our Space Referral Form

You can also register via the phone or call and arrange a time to pop in and see us to complete the form.

“For two hours in the week, I’m not depressed, for two hours I’m the person I could be, the person I want to be, the real me!”

Our Space participant

Supported by the Veterans’ Foundation.

In partnership with the Ministry of Justice.

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Our Space is a creative programme supporting adults facing multiple and complex challenges. It provides experiential interventions and transformative experiences that address issues surrounding mental health and well-being, community integration, resilience, and hope.

Our Space provides individuals with regular and meaningful activity, giving their week a focus and purpose, which contributes to their recovery and rehabilitation.

We use drama as a tool to play, offering people opportunities to escape their reality, to re-imagine themselves and to connect with others.

Who is Our Space for?

Adults (18+) with lived experience of homelessness, mental health issues, substance misuse, reoffending or feel socially isolated for other reasons benefit from the Our Space programme.

Our Space has been shaped over 16+ years, working in partnership with services and placing the lived experience of participants at the heart of the work.

This has been made possible thanks to National Lottery funding.

Our Outcomes 2024/2025

90% have gained self-esteem since working with us

97% have reported an increase in their confidence

84% feel more hopeful about their future

88% feel able to work well with others

92% feel part of a positive community

“It is a safe place where it doesn’t matter how I turn up – I know I’ll be supported. Staff are awesome, super supportive and go the extra mile when I’m struggling. I feel like I’ve found a community, and I’m part of a family even when I have to leave. I felt socially alone before, so I really appreciate the opportunity.”

Participant

Download our Evaluation Reports

Evaluation 2024

Evaluation 2025

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The Our Space Production Group is open exclusively to long-standing members who have progressed through the Our Space programme. This group offers a space for deeper artistic exploration and collaboration, where participants work alongside theatre professionals to devise and present bold new work. Sessions focus on advanced creative and technical skills, teamwork, and shared ownership of the creative process.

Through this work, members continue to develop confidence, leadership, and artistic voice, culminating in high-quality performances that challenge perceptions and celebrate the power of lived experience.

Our Space 2025 Production – Domestication

“Giving everyone space to bring themselves to the project fully and the high quality of the production design gave everyone the chance to really shine”

 Audience member

 

Our Space 2024 Production – Pierless

“I loved the whole process. The fact that we were able to develop it together, it wasn’t prewritten, our ideas were accepted and developed.”

 Cast member

 

Find out more about the making of  The Body Measures Time

 

Download our Evaluation Report

Evaluation 2025

Our Space at HMP Channings Wood

As part of Our Space, Theatre Royal Plymouth worked with men at HMP Channings Wood through a programme of weekly, skills-based creative workshops, using theatre as a space to build confidence, develop relationships and explore identity, choice and new possibilities.

In 2026, the group created and performed The Orchard, a new piece of theatre developed collaboratively through the workshops. The performance brought together a small group of men who committed to the process, taking them from weekly sessions to the experience of performing their work in front of an invited audience inside the prison.

The impact of the project went beyond the performance itself. Participants spoke about pushing themselves beyond their comfort zones, building confidence, finding moments of joy and creating positive memories. For some, the experience offered a chance to be seen as a person rather than defined by their circumstances.

 

Read more about The Orchard

 

“I think I’ve really grown through this process… it’s brought a whole new meaning to my life. Something I’ll take with me for the rest of my life.”

Participant and Cast Member