LOM celebrates ‘being kind to your mind’ with a week of wellbeing activities

May 2022 | News| People| Talking Point|

The team at LOM celebrated Mental Health Awareness Week with activities to support their wellbeing and mindfulness.

Annual Mental Health Awareness Week took place from 9th to 13th May. This year, LOM held a week of internals events and exhibitions under the banner ‘Be Kind to your Mind’. The aim of the activities was to give our team a platform and a safe space to consider their own wellbeing beyond the work that we do, which in turn might be reflected when using their experiences and sensitivity to shape the designs we create.

As architects and designers, the team at LOM are called upon daily to use the full extent of their creativity to bring about fresh ways of using space, solving problems, creating places for people to flourish – be that in work, at home, or at leisure. Doing this well not only requires a great awareness and understanding from designers of the challenges people face across all sectors and walks of life, our creative solutions also benefit when our team are as healthy and happy as they can be, both in work and beyond it.

The celebration of wellbeing was launched with a drinks event to open an exhibition of creative work by employees. This included a huge variety of art, pottery, sculpture, woodwork, photography, and even jewellery design. Architectural assistant Michael Roden described “what a pleasure it was to see the talent and works that members of the LOM team have developed and explored over recent years and through the pandemic”.

“The exhibition was fascinating and diverse. We were able to see the varied interests and passions our colleagues have outside of architecture.”

Matias Ellero, architectural assistant

With the activities in full swing, team members were able to attend a series of spaces, events and workshops across the week, from yoga in a special ‘restoration and reflection’ area, to ‘Ted Talks’ on the theme of ‘inspiration’. Those looking to practice or discover a skill could take part in still life drawing classes to connect with nature, or pottery workshops aimed to help delve deep into their creativity and making instincts.

The choice of activities meant the team could benefit from the sessions in a way that was tailored to them. Associate Chiara Cantilena enjoyed using the ‘restore and reflect’ yoga session to “take a chance to pause at the end of a busy day” – to “tune in mind and body” in a dimly let space surrounded by plants, calming music and candles.

The Ted talks proved popular too, with office manager Teresa Carter hopeful that they might become a “more regular lunchtime slot” as they gave her “so much to think about in a positive way”. The week demonstrated the reasons it’s important to take a step back – to think beyond the work we do and explore more with the people we work with. The team discovered each other’s talents, had time to reflect on their wellbeing, and to pick up new skills of their own.

A special thanks goes to Chiara Cantilena and Maliha Haque for spearheading the planning and organisation of the events, and to Teresa Carter and Lauren Deboo for their instrumental support. We’ll all be looking forward to more activities and sessions like these in the future. For now, the last word goes to Teresa: “I just wanted to say thank you, I’ve loved it”.

This article is by Simon Bird

Simon is a director of the practice, taking a leading role on strategic, interior and architectural projects.