Call out for writers: Bill’s Attic Writers’ Room
The Writers’ Block has developed a programme of specialist Writers’ Rooms around specific genres. They support emerging writers working with experienced professional writers developing writing with a direct route to audiences. The Writers’ Block specialises in playfulness and collaborations across the art forms, with writing at its heart.
This Writers’ Room will be led by Annamaria Murphy and is focused on an exhibition taken from Bill Mitchell’s extraordinary attic, once in the rafters of his home, now housed in Krowji.
The Writers’ Block is seeking 3 emerging writers who are interested in developing their skills and practice, informed and inspired by Bill’s way of working, to create new, forward looking work.
This Writers Room will be playful, experimental, theatrical. We will take the themes we find and explore them to see what forms and genres might come from them. This could be poetry, short form stories, or ideas of an epic piece of landscape theatre. You’ll need to be open and reactive and up for trying new things to inspire your writing.
There will be an opportunity to share the work created. This could be through readings, audio recording, printed postcards, performance.
Where: The Writers’ Block at The Ladder, 2-4 Clinton Road, Redruth, TR15 2QE
The venue is fully accessible.
When: Wed 19, Fri 21, Wed 26 November 2025. 10am to 4pm on each day.
Anna Murphy will lead the above days, and you will also need to allocate some personal writing time between 21 and 26 November as this final workshop will focus on sharing and editing.
You must be available for all 3 days.
Bursary: You will receive £400 to attend the workshops, write new work and attend the sharing session. There is no extra funding for travel or accommodation, thus this a call for writers resident in Cornwall & Devon.
Access: The Writers’ Block actively encourages new and under-represented writers. Our venue is fully accessible.
How to apply:
Please send the following to [email protected] by 9am on Wednesday 22 October 2025.
- An expression of interest saying why you want to be part of this Writers’ Room and how this fits with your ambitions and writing journey
- Examples of your work (3 poems, 3 short pieces of prose, or an excerpt from a longer piece. No more than 3 sides of A4 total)
- Confirmation that you are available for 19, 21 and 26 November
Please include this in one single word document or PDF in an attachment to the email.
Successful applicants will be notified by 31 October.
About Bill Mitchell and Bill’s Attic
Bill was an artist, designer, director, theatre maker, and visionary. He was Artistic Director of Kneehigh Theatre and later set up his own landscape theatre company – WildWorks. Bill’s attic was his imaginarium, his theatrical and imaginative playground where he explored ideas, landscape, design, colour, notions of myth, story, the dark and light of the human condition. He created ever changing 3D collages from his vast collection of ephemera. A box of red, a box of war, shelves of dolls head, hands, bird skulls, an envelope of prescriptions from eBay or car boots to name a few. He created beautiful sketch books, works of art in themselves, sometimes related to shows, sometimes on a theme.
The Writers’ Block, in collaboration with artists Sue Hill and Tony Crosby, and writer Annamaria Murphy have chosen a selection of Bill’s works to inspire this Writers Room.
You can find out more about Bill’s Attic at https://billsattic.org/
About Annamaria Murphy
Anna is a renowned writer, facilitator and community catalyst. Anna is former Artistic Director and co-founder of The Writers’ Block, and has written for Kneehigh, Radio 4, o-region to name but a few. Anna finds the extraordinary in the ordinary, is a master of the short story with a twist, and is deeply connected to Cornwall and its community, championing young people, emerging writers and Cornish culture.
