A Safety Net for Mental Health
Leading the way for new life
Standfirst
Manchester and the School of Art have been at the forefront of textile innovation since the late 19th Century. This piece explores how, in the University’s 200th year, academics are taking their art in different directions, breaking down barriers and helping others.
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Dr Lynn Setterington has combined her experience in communicating with hard-to-reach groups and textile design to get people talking and thinking about mental health in the construction industry.
This topic of conversation is unlikely to come up during the morning brew break and sometimes the biggest smiles hide the hardest struggles.
There is a high risk of suicide among construction workers. In 2021, 507 construction workers died by suicide which equates to an average of two workers taking their own life every working day.
Dr Setterington’s Safety Net initiative provides the opportunity to explore this serious issue. Funded by the Arts Council, the project aimed to start new conversations and ways of working with the sector whilst breaking down the stigma about men’s mental health.
In a city that is under constant development, there are over 85,000 people employed in construction in Greater Manchester.
Aptly, building and scaffolding were used to get an important message coined by the World Health Organisation out to these workers: ‘There is no health without mental health.’
I liked that it was out there in the public domain and could be seen by anybody. It is a chance encounter that might provoke conversations.
Attached to the debris net on buildings in Chapel Steet, Salford and Oldham Road, Manchester, to coincide with World Mental Health Day, the colourful installations aimed to make construction workers and the wider public stop and think about mental health.
It is estimated that almost a quarter of a million people will have seen the installations in the month that they were in situ. Taking the important message beyond the building site out to the masses.
Dr Setterington commented: “I liked that it was out there in the public domain and could be seen by anybody. It is a chance encounter that might provoke conversations.”
The installations were designed by Lynn and sewn by young people from 42nd Street, a mental health organisation that supports young people with their emotional health and well-being. Students from the Textile in Practice course at Manchester School of Art where Lynn is a senior lecturer also put their needlework skills into practice to piece the panels together.
The reach of the net and the letters continue. The letters are now on display at the Doctor Guslow Mental Health Museum in Belgium. Over the Summer, Lynn will use the net as part of a well-being project with refugees. She plans to create a huge world map to convey that we are all part of one planet and the need to come together and be kind.
Lynn is also looking into other users for the net. Once they have been used on building sites they are discarded and not recycled, so she is exploring how they can be used creatively.
She explained: “I’ve been quilting with it, stitching, and have asked someone to crochet with it to make things. I want to see if it can be used in different ways to make things and find ways of keeping it alive. I am also interested in exploring if it could be made from other biodegradable materials.”
Dr Setterington is working with design students at the University of California to share ideas about the debris net and continues to engage with the construction industry to seek their input too.
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