Site-Specific Installation for Ilam Hall

OUTSIDE and the National Trust are seeking an installation that celebrates the history of Ilam as Ilam Hall celebrates its 200th anniversary.

Deadline: 30/3/26

Scoring 9^th April
Commission Fee: £10,000
Location: National Trust Ilam Park, Staffordshire

The National Trust at Ilam Park invites proposals from artists, designers, and collaborative collectives for a site-responsive installation that celebrates the history of Ilam as the hall celebrates its 200^th anniversary. We welcome applications from practitioners with something new to say in response to the layered histories, landscapes, and communities of the Ilam Park estate.

Practitioners may be working in sculpture, spatial installation, interactive design, environmental art, sound, or cross-disciplinary practice, and may be established or emerging.

The installation must be sensitively designed to suit a site with multiple designations (including SSSI, conservation area) and must be robust enough to withstand open access by the public for approximately seven weeks outdoors in the summer.

Commission Aim

We are seeking an installation that celebrates 200 years of Ilam Hall.  This site-specific installation will illuminate the estate’s layered heritage from its dramatic geological origins to its Iron Age and Roman-era past, through centuries of agricultural use and the many evolutions of Ilam Hall, to the present-day landscape enjoyed by local and visiting communities alike.

We seek work that helps people feel these histories: something playful, tactile, memorable, and emotionally engaging. The installation should make Ilam Park’s long story accessible and meaningful to all ages, including families, school groups, and visitors with varied access requirements. In this commission, we are interested in creative responses that:

• Engage families and visitors of all ages, encouraging curiosity, play, and shared discovery.
• Are fully accessible, thoughtfully designed for people with physical mobility needs, sensory sensitivities, neurodiversity, and mental health considerations.
• Focus on sustainability, using low-impact or reclaimed materials, and demonstrating responsible environmental thinking.
• Bring to life the multiple histories within Ilam Park, some of which may be new to local communities and visitors, including, but not limited to, its geological past (limestone landscapes, rivers, deep time); the settlement histories connected to the region; and present use.
• Respond to contemporary themes relating to agriculture, land stewardship, connection to nature and heritage, and the tourist landscape.

We are especially keen on proposals that connect these layers with themes of care for land, community belonging, and wellbeing; and on proposals that inform different ways of working in the future.

Context

Ilam Park, overlooking the dramatic landscape of Dovedale, is a site of rich and complex heritage. The estate’s story stretches from ancient rock formations shaped over millions of years, through the human presence of prehistoric and Roman-era activity, to its later development as a working agricultural landscape and adjoining village. Now a place where people live, work, stay, learn, and visit for leisure and conservation, the commissioned artwork should help visitors experience these layers in new and imaginative ways.

What We’re Looking For

We encourage proposals that engage and invigorate participants by encouraging them to try something new, possibly for the first time. Specifically, we are looking for a practitioner who can create something that:

• Offers sensory or interactive elements suitable for diverse audiences, including tactile, auditory, or low-stimulation pathways.
• Encourages creative play, gentle exploration, or peaceful reflection especially in relation to what the place was like, is currently like, and could be like.
• Can be experienced at different levels—intellectually, physically, emotionally—so visitors can engage on their own terms.
• Demonstrates durability and environmental sensitivity, with considered choices around materials, sourcing, and end-of-life plans.
• Is feasible for installation and maintenance in an outdoor or semi-outdoor open access setting.

We are looking for new ways to bring to life the rich and varied history of Ilam Park. We want the installation to evoke the lives and stories embedded in this place. This may include human and environmental narratives.

This commission is an opportunity to create a powerful, accessible storytelling experience that deepens visitors’ connection to Ilam Park and environs remarkable past and its contemporary role in conservation, community and tourism.

Eligibility

Open to local, national, and international artists who create extraordinary work connected to heritage, environment, play and community. We encourage applications from artists who are under-represented in rural areas, including the global majority, disabled, excluded by gender or sexuality, from lower socio-economic backgrounds or intersections of the above.

Budget

The commission fee will cover artist time, materials, fabrication, installation, travel, and associated public engagement activity which includes a minimum of three days consulting and co-creating with: the local community; people who work or volunteer at Ilam Park; and the visiting community working in partnership with the project’s Creative Community Producer.

What to Submit

Proposals should describe your concept, materials, methods of interaction, and relevance to the brief, and a provisional timeline and budget. Proposals will also include:

• a short biography, telling us something about yourself, your work and artistic ambitions
• examples of relevant past work
• an overview of access, sustainability and environmental impact considerations.

We welcome a conversation about how we can support you with your application.

Timeline

• Call-Out Launch: 9 February 2026
• Site tour / orientation for interested artists: Monday 2 March 2026. Tours are available from 10am, with the last tour at 2pm. email lorna.stoddart@supportstaffordshire.org.uk to arrange.
• Deadline for Proposals: 30 March 2026
• Shortlisting: 9 April 2026
• Presentation of final work: 20 July – 1 September 2026 inclusive

Selection

Proposals will be reviewed and selected by a small panel comprising The National Trust, Ilam Park; OUTSIDE Arts; volunteer and community representation.

Selection is based on ambition, integrity, sustainability, legacy, and access.

Help applying

Please send your application or any queries to: lorna.stoddart@supportstaffordshire.org.uk

Artists are invited to visit Ilam Park on Monday 2 March from 10am for a site tour with the Creative Community Producer.

A video introducing the accessible spaces available for the installation is also available to view – Experience Community at Ilam Park

About OUTSIDE

OUTSIDE is a consortium led Creative People & Places Project for the Staffordshire Moorlands. Our purpose is to ensure more people are experiencing and inspired by arts and culture. OUTSIDE is working with residents from across the Staffordshire Moorlands to enrich lives through storytelling which celebrates local people, culture and places.

About the National Trust

The National Trust is an independent conservation charity founded in 1895 by three people: Octavia Hill, Sir Robert Hunter and Hardwicke Rawnsley, who saw the importance of the nation’s heritage and open spaces and wanted to preserve them for everyone to enjoy. Today, across England, Wales and Northern Ireland, we continue to look after places so people and nature can thrive.

We care for more than 250,000 hectares of countryside, 780 miles of coastline, 1 million collection items and 500 historic properties, gardens and nature reserves. The National Trust is for everyone – we were founded for the benefit of the whole nation, and our 5.38 million members, funders and donors, and tens of thousands of volunteers support our work to care for nature, beauty, history for everyone, for ever.

In January 2025 the National Trust marked its 130th birthday by launching its new 10-year strategy People and Nature Thriving. This strategy, which will guide the charity’s work and direction from 2025-2035 and beyond, focuses on three key goals:

• Restore Nature
• End unequal access to nature, beauty and history
• Inspire more people to care and take action

The plans follow the largest public consultation ever carried out by the National Trust, with more than 70,000 people – including members, volunteers and industry partners – sharing their views on the Trust’s work and direction.