Harbour of Hope
A creative place to explore local stories of hope in the Falmouth community
10+ Years Experience
2,500+ People
80+ Programmes
100+ Workshops
You are at the Ship Inn. An imaginary pub on the headland, just outside Falmouth.
There has been a storm surge. Trees have come down across the only road that leads in. Everyone is staying for the night.
A folk session is underway. Fiddles, a guitar, drinks, laughter. The locals start telling stories and the talk soon turns to hope. To what a good life might look like here in 2050.
Like the Falmouth Packet ships that once carried messages from this harbour to the world, this message of hope and creativity is sent outwards.
And so the story begins…
3 sold-out nights
200 seats per night
50+ performers
Live recorded album
Imagine the show
It's the final night of a three-night run at the Poly in Falmouth. The house is full and buzzing in one of the oldest and most loved performance halls in Cornwall.
On stage, the scene is set at the imaginary pub. A small cast of actors and community members play the parts of the stranded locals. This cast would have been rehearsing for two months and are joined by a swell of folk musicians and local choirs. Behind them, the Ship Inn comes to life as the storm-stranded travellers tell stories of hope that begin to reshape what 2050 could feel like.
In the audience are the friends, families and colleagues of everyone who is taking part. They are joined by those who came through the eight creative workshops that fed into this final piece, many seeing their own words and voices woven into the show. And alongside them, people from right across different communities in the Falmouth area have shown up, many of whom are inspired by the positive vision for the future.
A few weeks later, an album of the original music recorded live across the performances is on sale online, continuing this vision and community-connection outwards.
"This experience will stay in my heart forever.... I have rekindled a love for humankind."
Feedback from a Creative Workshop in 2025
Why now?
A sounding is how sailors once measured the depth of water beneath them. It is a weighted line, lowered until it found the bottom. Here are soundings of how deep anxiety about the future currently runs in the UK and in Cornwall and negatively impacts wellbeing.
75%
of young people across the UK and nine other countries say the future is frightening (University of Bath)
93%
of UK adults said they felt worried for future generations when thinking about environmental issues (The Reading Agency)
66%
of young people are feeling sad, afraid, anger, powerlessness, despair and grief (University of Bath)
859
Cornwall residents who were surveyed by Cornwall Council, who found that they were more concerned about climate change than the national average
17
neighbourhoods in Cornwall fall within the top 10% most deprived areas in England (Index of Multiple Deprivation).
Cornwall's response to climate anxiety has increasingly focused on imagination and storytelling by helping people "design a plan for a better future for Falmouth" and sharing stories that "give hope for the future”, such as the Strategy Room, commissioned by Nesta, an innovation charity. Harbour of Hope builds on this by bringing to life such stories of hope in a more creative and powerful way that will inspire the community.
“The space encourages and inspires deep creation, connection and joy.”
Feedback from a Creative Workshop in 2022
The Workshops: One harbour, many voices
In the first phase of the project, there will be eight creative workshops held across Falmouth in partnership with local organisations, reaching at least 100 people over a wide mix of ages and backgrounds. Each workshop centres on a creative practice and participants will dream into a hopeful future for 2050. Each workshop is a complete experience in its own right, as well as the research and development for the final piece.
Feedback from a Change in Nature Creative Programme in September 2025
❈100% gained insights and practices to integrate into your life
❈100% felt nourished and supportive of community
❈100% enhanced physical and mental wellbeing
❈98% felt inspired
❈95% have tried new things or learned new skills
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"Totally transformational. I am returning to life a different person."
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"You have changed my world, and inspired me to bring these gifts of story and compassion to others."
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"I am leaving feeling nourished and hopeful. We are creating a beautiful new world."
Project Leaders
Martha Tilston
Martha Tilston has developed a successful career in music and film making with a large and loyal following worldwide. She has played her music on some of the world’s most prestigious stages and festivals and released several critically acclaimed albums. In the world of film making, Martha has gained nominations for best arts film for The Clifftop Sessions and recently released her feature film The Tape which she wrote and directed. Martha also studied theatre and lectures in song writing, performance and the telling of story through song. Her passion is unlocking the creativity and story in all of us.
Andy Raingold
As Co-Founder and Director of Change in Nature, Andy supports people and organisations to make meaningful action in this pivotal time. He is a facilitator, coach, speaker, environmental campaigner and social entrepreneur with a wealth of experience leading people through transformation. As featured in:
Previous Work
This project builds on Martha’s acclaimed feature film, The Tape, available to stream on Amazon Prime with over 600,000 views. Martha writes and directs this gripping story, a folk musical of hope and connection set in Cornwall.
“A celebration of the purity of inspiration and pure musical artistry” Film and TV Now
“A charming film debut from folk singer Martha Tilston” The Guardian
How the project will help to make a difference
Workshop participants will:
Feel more connected to their community, across differences of age, background and experience
Gain concrete creative tools and practices (in music, storytelling and art) that can be carried into everyday life
Build confidence to write and share their own stories with others
Experience a meaningful boost in personal wellbeing and mental health through creative practice
Feel more inspired, more hopeful and more empowered to imagine and contribute to a positive future
Community performers (actors, choirs, musicians) will:
Amateur actors experience the full arc of a professional production, from audition through rehearsal to performance on a well-known stage
Local choirs and musicians have the rare opportunity to contribute to and perform original, purpose-written music as part of a community work
All performers develop confidence, stage presence, vocal skills and an understanding of collaborative performance-making
Lasting bonds are formed across performing groups who might not otherwise have met
Participants leave with a genuine sense of creative achievement
The audiences will:
Leave with a renewed sense of hope and a felt sense of what a flourishing future could look like
Be inspired that creative and community projects are possible
For Falmouth and the wider community:
Creates a unique, living archive of local stories of hope which contributes to how Falmouth imagines its future
Demonstrates that community-led arts projects can bring together people across socioeconomic backgrounds around a shared, positive vision
Complements Falmouth's own long-term planning and place-making but in a creative, community-driven and emotionally resonant way that official processes rarely achieve
The album carries the stories and music to wider audiences in Cornwall and beyond
Models an approach to hope-building that can be replicated in other communities
Why we will achieve what we want it to?
Change in Nature has delivered over 100 creative and nature-based workshops across the last decade, with more than 2,500 participants and a consistently strong feedback record.
One of it’s current programmes, Thrive in Nature, which is a series of local creative workshops held every six weeks in the Falmouth area, has attracted over 200 participants in its first year across eight sessions. For the workshop that focused on hope, 100% felt more connection to community, 97% experienced a boost in their personal wellbeing and 88% felt more hopeful. The model is proven with a loyal local following and relationships with local organisations and creatives that are already in place.
Andy and Martha have been co-facilitating events and retreats together for many years, including on songwriting, creativity and storytelling. This is not a new creative partnership but a successful one that has years of experience working together.
Martha Tilston's live performances regularly sell out venues across Cornwall, including the Poly in Falmouth, the Cornish Bank and, notably, the Minack Theatre with a capacity of 600. A three-night sold-out run at the Poly is consistent with her established local audience.
Her feature film The Tape demonstrates the capacity to take a large, ambitious creative project from conception to high-quality completion. As her Spotify biography puts it, her songs "shimmer with stillness, truth and luminous hope" and the BBC has described her as having "the voice of a storyteller and the ear of a poet".
Relationships with local choirs and folk musicians (including Hum Choir, Many Men Soundsystem and Falmouth Voice) are already in place, both personally and professionally.
"I am leaving with the biggest heart and a renewed sense of hope."
This is how a participant described leaving a previous Change in Nature programme and it is how we want everyone to feel who engage with this project.
As one participant at a previous gathering put it, this project is about modelling a future that we all know is possible.
