Ebbsfleet Citizens Handbook was commissioned by Cement Fields for Ebbsfleet Citizen Archive and is made in collaboration between artist Lu Williams and current residents in and around Ebbsfleet garden city.
This alternative guide to the area features written histories and folklore, visual documentation and interactive sections for residents to add their own memories and dreams for the area. The hand-crafted artefact is intended to be passed down between generations, preserving and sharing the rich identity of Ebbsfleet, Greenhithe, Swanscombe and Northfleet, allowing the publication to grow into the future.
Ebbsfleet Citizens Handbook came together over 10 months of community workshops, public events, walks, research and call outs for contributions. Led by Lu, local people were invited to join hands-on creative zine-making workshops, meet fellow residents to think about the nature of home, place and memory, what they might want from the new city, and how these reflections could be captured in the Handbook.
Inside opens with area introductions by historian Christoph Bull, followed by illustrations, handmade collages, poetry, photography and personal messages contributed by residents. Tucked inside a front pocket is a sticker sheet inviting people to complete the cover stories with their own customisations. A full colour 68-page zine of residents’ artworks can be found in a second back pocket. A pull out poster features citizen drawings of their own homes and potential future homes on one side, and scans of handmade plasticine fridge magnets on the reverse, generated from a workshop with Lu and local families at the Ebbsfleet Fusion Festival in 2023. Readers can also learn of local groups and activities, and discover exercises for past, current and incoming residents.
Ebbsfleet Citizens Handbook is part of Ebbsfleet Citizen Archive, a community-led project capturing and preserving the varied stories and histories of the people and places of Ebbsfleet, Greenhithe, Swanscombe, and Northfleet, inviting local people to work with artists, historians and fellow residents, to explore the area’s unique historic and contemporary identity through objects, sounds, videos and photographs, collected by and from residents past, present and future.
Ebbsfleet Citizen Archive is funded by The National Lottery Heritage Fund and Arts Council England, and supported by Ebbsfleet Development Corporation, Gravesham Libraries, Dartford Museum and Libraries, and Kent Archives.
All the materials gathered through the project can be now be accessed via ebbsfleetcitizenarchive.org, where you can also upload your own contributions.
View and download a digital version of the Handbook here.
You can pick up a free copy of the Handbook at the following locations:
Dartford Museum and Library DA1 1EU
Gravesend Library DA12 1BE
Blue Bean Cafe DA10 1AD
Bellway Sales Office Northfleet DA11 9AS
Swanscombe Library DA10 0BZ
Hive House Library DA11 9DE
Dashwood Library DA11 7LY
Fleetdown Library DA2 6JZ
Greenhithe Library DA9 9EJ
The Handbook will also be available at Ebbsfleet Development Corporation pop ups at the following events:
Fusion Festival Jubilee Park 6th July 12:00 – 16:00
Ebbsfleet International 10th July 16:30 – 18:30
Cherry Orchard Summer Fayre 18th July 15:00 – 17:00
Ebbsfleet Summer Market Jubilee Park 20th July 11:00 – 17:00
Lu Williams (b.1993, Essex) is an artist producing sculpture, print, zines, drawing, writing, video, events and workshops through research, community engagement, collecting and collaboration. They make work around the themes of place and memory; community and collaboration; collecting; class and upbringing; accessibility; and platforming and uplifting marginalised voices- through the lens of queerness, neurodivergence and working classness. They are interested in class and taste, queerness, ecology, systems, paraphernalia and the notion of the ‘disposable’; elevating everyday off cuts, often ephemeral and nostalgic, into the valued but functional ‘art object’.
In 2015 they created Grrrl Zine Fair, a place for self-publishing and DIY art, music and culture surrounding feminist publishing. In 2017 the Grrrl Zine Library was born and hosted 600+ queer feminist zines, housed at The Old Waterworks. In 2020 they co-founded Dog Ear, dog toy sculptures and accompanying publications produced by artists, with artist Emma Edmondson. Williams is currently based in Leigh-on-sea, working from The Old Waterworks artist studios, Southend-on-sea and is on the Southend Community Investment Board and will be joining the Creative Estuary Board in September 2023.
The Ebbsfleet Citizens Handbook cover is screen-printed on recycled board, with a sticker sheet printed on apple pulp paper. The handbook itself is a mix of colour and risograph printed pages, produced by hand on recycled paper in the artist’s studio at The Old Waterworks. Soy-based inks and stencils made from plant fibres are non-toxic and use high luminosity colours to produce textured, tactile prints.
Concept, drawings, writing, production and printing by Lu Williams.
Words by Christoph Bull.
Curator and producer Michaela Freeman.
Contributions from hundreds of residents including Swanscombe & Greenhithe Local History Group, Margaret and Leslie, St Mary’s Groups, Swanscombe Brownies and Rainbows, the Bingo ladies, Castle Hill community centre, Eastgate community centre, Ebbsfleet Design Group, Ebbsfleet Academy, North Kent College, Mandi Knight, Huggens College, local history walking groups, Pam Childs-Kelly, Peter Day, Steve Kelly, Gili, Alison C, Alison Hillman, Precious Othieno, Winnie Jones, @mard.arts, KD, @hollyportfolioo, @wasteofspace885, Derek Parris, Steve Mace, M. MCarthy and those who joined us at Heritage Community Hall.
Special thanks to assistants on the project: Gillian Austen, Elleanna Chapman, Liam Cosford, Fanny Von Beaverhausen and Gülşen Güler.
The Handbook also includes a poem by poet Dzifa Benson, commissioned for This Must Be the Place.