Sallie is a freelance arts consultant with 20 years of experience working in the professional and community cultural sectors. Her expertise in fundraising/bid writing, business development, evaluation and partnership building has made her one of Leicestershire's most sought-after arts consultants.
Sallie is University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust's Creative Health & Heritage lead, development manager for BrightSparks Arts in Mental Health CIO (Leicestershire NHS Partnership Trust) and Area Creative Coordinator for the national programme, Live Well & Dance with Parkinson's.
She has many years' experience of managing a range of cultural projects, festivals, venues, touring projects and commissioning. Sallie has worked with a range of local authorities, charities, cultural organisations and professional artists in arts and health development roles. Her current work is focussed on aligning local partners in the development and delivery of creative health programmes.
Sallie is currently developing a network to support arts in social prescribing in Leicester/Shire.
Natalie is a BACP Accredited, fully qualified and experienced psychotherapist able to work with a number of counselling modalities, presenting issues and mental health diagnoses.
Over the past seven years, she has worked with trauma, depression, anxiety, bereavement, abuse, self-harm, substance misuse, domestic violence, mental health diagnoses and relationship issues, among many others.
Natalie has worked with both children and adults and has extensive experience in complex trauma. She has provided counselling in high security prisons, charities, youth hostels, schools, wellbeing centres, a Local Authority, a university, a Rape Crisis centre and various counselling centres/online counselling platforms. As well as counselling, Natalie provides clinical supervision, acts as a Safeguarding Lead on creative projects and has led therapeutic art workshops.
Please get in touch and discuss the many ways in which we could potentially collaborate with you or your organisation.
Our recent projects include The Weave Approach at Loughborough Wellbeing Centre and Hinckley & Bosworth Community Houses.
The Weave Approach is a holistic package in which two forms of therapeutic intervention are interwoven. Based on over 20 years of experience in both mental health and the arts, the partnership behind Weave Creative Productions devised the Approach as an alternative to traditional counselling or art therapy routes.
The Weave Approach has a strong USP for people who would benefit from a more holistic / multi-faceted therapeutic intervention to deal with and address common mental health challenges, such as anxiety, depression, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, bereavement or addiction.
Artist led and counselling sessions are delivered through weekly sessions in which participants can both process their artwork with a counsellor and process their counselling sessions with an artist, in an interwoven approach where both therapeutic forms are used in tandem. The approach is less daunting for someone feeling trepidation around counselling and more substantial for someone who wants more than a creative outlet for their mental wellbeing.
Many people turned to art in lockdown as a form of therapy. And yet the Covid-19 pandemic will leave many more in need of counselling. Combining the two brings together the perspectives, experience and training of two professionals – an artist and a psychotherapist, working hand in hand to guide each participant through their own unique therapeutic journey.
Following The Weave Approach, signposting will be in place to further support participants. Weave is able to facilitate counselling and/or arts-based provision should partner organisations require this.
Please contact us to discuss the cost of sessions. Each session is 50 minutes long and we would recommend a commitment of either weekly or biweekly sessions.
Sessions are undertaken either remotely using MS Teams or face to face from premises in either Leicester city centre or between junctions 21 and 20 of the M1 in South Leicestershire.
Natalie is BACP Accredited.
You can self-refer by contacting us. Please note that we are unable to accept referrals on another's behalf. Once contact has been made with us, we will go through a self-referral process to assess your needs.
The service provided through Weave is not intended for crisis situations and urgent needs. In a crisis situation, you are advised to call local emergency or crisis services, or visit the nearest A&E.
Weave is developing a network for professionals working with people who would benefit from creative interventions to support their health outcomes, and a network to support creative practitioners wanting to develop their practice.
Please get in touch if you would like to find out more