Good News Spotlight 🔦 Andi Oliver’s Fabulous Feasts in Stoke 📺

A true representation of Stoke's heart and soul, with food, art, community and creativity championed at the Portland Inn Project in Hanley.

When you tell me Stoke is on TV or in the media, I’m bracing myself for something negative. Something typical, a documentary about drugs or crime. Some B-roll footage of dilapidated buildings, probably some news reporter pacing through the streets talking as if they’re in a warzone. The final shot cuts to a piece of paint curling off a wall or a boarded up shop front.

I’m tired of where I’m from being the punchline of bad jokes. Or, being a bit of poverty porn for people who’ve barely ever left the M25 so they can talk about “working class stuff” at dinner parties.

Watching Andi Oliver’s Fabulous Feasts in Stoke, changed all that. It’s the best representation of Stoke and Staffordshire I’ve ever seen on TV. One that I felt truly captured the soul of Stoke, now. There were references to the past, but no lingering. Instead the show centred on arts-led regeneration at the Portland Inn Project.

Available on BBC iPlayer HERE.

Andi Oliver interviewed founders of the Portland Inn Project Anna and Rebecca, as well as working with chef Thom Bateman of the Flintlock Arms on a Staffordshire Lobby, Cris Cohen of FEASTED and STOCK on an Oatcake dish and she foraged some lovely wild goodness with Emma Cronin of Wild Pickle to make a sauerkraut. This all culminated in a celebratory feast at Portland Inn HQ with the whole community there.

There was something deeply emotive about the whole show, probably brought about by the wonderful children happily playing in the streets of Hanley and the diverse community coming together. Andi Oliver was visibly moved throughout, by the big heart of the people she met and by the clay itself.

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This show captured everything I see in Stoke and Staffordshire now. Everything. Good people, arts, creativity, community and the beautiful green fields of Staffordshire. All working towards serving the people who need it; the next generation growing up in an economically and culturally deprived area that, in Andi’s words, is “asking for something”.

For all The Knot subscribers, this is an absolute must watch. it’s a chance to look at the incredibly positive work happening right now in your area and see a regenerative future for Stoke-on-Trent and Staffordshire that is not gentrification, that does not push people out for expensive coffees. A regenerative future that serves our community today.

A final note to Stoke-on-Trent City Council.

Dear Council Leaders,

Give the city over to arts led organisations like Portland Inn Project, Urban Wilderness and MIddleport Matters as much as you can. Give them the keys, give them the buildings, give them budget and grants. These are the people and organisations that will regenerate Stoke-on-Trent and wider areas.

Yours sincerely,
James