St. Laurence KirkForres, Scotland2026

Team:
Sheng Fei Chen
Simona Ondraskova
Yige Li
Xueying Feng
Clarisse Jean Pierre Towler
Robin Tammer
Yiting Yu
Yixuan Zhou

Supervisors:
Scott Carballo
Xinyue Liu
Chuan Zhao

Intro:In late 2024, the Church of Scotland made the decision to sell the building of St Laurence Kirk. A charity was formed to keep this iconic building in community hands and ensure it remains part of Forres’ future. The St. Laurence Trust is a charity that is now working toward regenerating it as a space for creative arts and culture.

We were asked to:

Brainstorm revenue streams to cover the building’s operating costs;
Invite the extended community of Forres to adopt the building in its new function;
Do both in a way that is respectful to the old congregation.

Concept of the seasonsFrom my education in transformations and emotional processes, I brought in the idea of a concept centered around the story of the seasons: the old congregation is going into an autumn and winter of sorts, with familiar things changing and having to be let go of. At the same time, we are hoping new life to take form in St. Laurence Kirk by inviting those that previously hadn’t known the place as their own (spring). Then, we are hoping to have bunches of exciting community activities happen there (summer). Through this narrative, we can transform the old congregation’s process narrative from one of just “loss” as one of nurturing fertile ground, being integrated into what’s to come. This also fosters empathy and respect in the ‘newcomers’, while at the same time giving them permission to start something new. The universal narrative of the changing seasons integrates the commonly invisibilised experiences of loss and endings, and functions as a shared language for inter-generational dialogue.

Deliverables & PresentationWe produced three ‘products’ that work as a unit to meet the needs of the new St. Laurence:

An event-calendar system
Zine
A floor mural

The physical event-calendar (designed to show events literally taking place at different times during the year) is the main driver of commercial events in St. Laurence Kirk.

The little ‘zine’ we created functions to bring the narrative of a changing St. Laurence, which will now be a place for them all, to the people of Forres. It does so by describing this process using seasonal metaphors (without ever being explicit), and offering questions designed to evoke positive imagination towards shared futures in St. Laurence. Just like the seasons, it cycles infinitely, without apparent beginning or end.

The large floor mural, we hope, will anchor this narrative in physical space. It combines the narrative of the seasons with St. Laurence’s famous stained glass windows. Beyond this initial transformative phase, we hope it can serve as a reminder for the changing and cyclical nature of life in times to come, and the unity that brings. It is the main emotional anchor point of the project.

My thanks go out to our team, our supervisors, Glasgow School of Art Forres Campus, St. Laurence Trust, and all others who participated and made this project possible.

Key words:
Local
Community
Intergenerational dialogue