There’s an area in the northeast of England where planners, health providers, arts organisations and local government are collaborating to develop places which not only “do no harm” to people and the environment but also actively promote good health.
It’s not Shangri-la or Oz or even an officially designated Blue Zone, but a region made up of multiple local government organisations, NHS delivery vehicles, and charitable bodies focused on creative arts, mental health and community development. The people leading them have come together to support a programme called Healthy Happy Places -- conceived, designed and led by long-term resident Dr Rachel Turnbull.
Rachel established Healthy Happy Places to build upon existing good practice in collaborative planning and public health within the region by establishing an approach to improving health and wellbeing through design focused solutions. It’s centred around an innovation hub in the Northeast and North Cumbria where collaboration amongst public, private and third sector organisations is encouraged and supported through multiple programme aims:
To create a regional hub to connect people and projects to stimulate innovative practices for healthy, happy environments.
To respond to inequalities experienced in the North East and North Cumbria with participatory planning and design-based solutions.
To evaluate the impact of design interventions on wellbeing and contribute to the knowledge base.
To understand the current regional position and policies for supporting the development of healthy, happy places and assess gaps and needs.
To understand good practice and assess gaps within existing national policies, guidance and frameworks for the development of healthy, happy places.
To explore the concept and feasibility of creating a health and wellbeing design review panel supported by a mental health and wellbeing design toolkit for the North-East and North Cumbria.
To celebrate and promote existing best practice in the region.
To share knowledge and innovative practices of wellbeing in the built and designed environment across different disciplines and systems.
I recently sat down with Rachel and asked her about the origins of the programme, its challenges and successes and how it can inspire other local areas to adopt something similar. Our interview follows.
How did you identify the need and develop the concept for Healthy Happy Places?
In a nutshell, Healthy Happy Places is about taking action to collectively create good mental health and wellbeing through the built environment by acting as a bridge between sectors and the community. It’s about coming together to turn unloved spaces into more joyful, calming, and nurturing places to be. It has been developed as a creative and innovative approach to tackling health inequalities and the wider determinants of health (the ‘causes of causes’).
Healthy Happy Places started as a programme in 2021. It was an idea that I shared with some colleagues in the health sector after completing a combined degree in architecture and urban planning. My background is in clinical psychology and project management so lots of people wondered what on earth I was doing going back to studying and in such a different topic. To me though, it made sense!
As I’m sure most readers of this blog will know, there is a compelling case for why we should be doing more to influence and shape our environments to improve our health. I got intrigued by the topic and given that I was sitting between these worlds of health and design and planning, I was curious about what might be possible to take action in the region, a place that is home, and which I am really passionate about. The North East has many assets and brilliant things about it, but unfortunately the health statistics often highlight some of our communities as experiencing some of the worst health outcomes nationally. Although I don’t like using the word ‘deprivation’ (as all places have good things), the health data paints a picture that is not very positive, and in some cases very unequal, with the gap between affluent and less affluent places being miles apart in terms of things like life expectancy, and healthy life expectancy. I wanted to scratch behind those figures and think about how we could start to address these things from outside of the NHS, right here in the North East. Just a small task then!
How did you present this to your funders to secure their support?
Because these ways of viewing health, and ways of working are often quite different to what is considered the norm, and don’t fall into one specific sector, funding is a huge challenge – who funds, and who gets the eventual benefits?
At the time, the NHS Long Term Plan was recommending that the built environment sector and the NHS work together better to improve health and wellbeing (NHS England, 2019) and the Healthy New Towns Programme recommended a “whole systems approach to creating healthier places” (pg. 7; NHS England, 2019). A proposal outlined some key pieces of evidence from the health sector, planning and design sectors and a set of ‘possibilities’ for a programme of work in the North East.
I was very fortunate that my employer, Health Innovation Northeast and North Cumbria, was very supportive of the idea and the initial ‘pitch’ - the organisation exists after all, to support, develop, and champion innovation in health so at the time of inception this programme fit really nicely into the strategic objectives for the region. I also had some fantastic support from colleagues within the mental health programme of the Integrated Care System who were also looking at how healthier communities could be created so the goals and ambitions aligned really well.
The evidence for ‘the reason why’ is difficult to argue with. Having a solution to address the problem is another story of course – there are plenty of challenges with making change in this space (I’ve encountered several!), but the potential rewards are huge.
Have you encountered barriers to collaboration? What processes have you put in place to encourage and support the collaboration needed to drive this programme?
What I would say, is that the ambition was big, but the scale of the programme was small – there was no big team, no big budgets - so yes there were absolutely challenges along the way. However, I’ve been extremely blessed to have had some amazing supporters in the region and beyond who have been with me all the way and provided that motivation and encouragement to keep going with it. Around every project there was a collective, and although not a set of ‘criteria’ in the strictest sense we ensured that we had people part of it which came from different perspectives – for example, from design, community, local authority (in most cases, including public health, planning, regeneration/housing etc) as well as healthcare, and the creative sector.
The processes, for me, are as much about building relationships, the development of trust, and by trying to create psychologically safe spaces where voices can be heard and opinions shared. This doesn’t, and can’t happen overnight of course.
How do you measure impact of the programme on local communities?
As the programme was small scale most of our impact has been gathered qualitatively and presented through quotes and videos. Measuring the impact of these types of programmes and ways of working remains challenging and requires resources and expertise to do it well. I’d be very welcoming of further conversation on this.
Do you think Healthy Happy Places is a template for other areas in England and elsewhere?
Absolutely! Coming soon will be a website and resources that will share the journey, our projects, and what is available. In the meantime, you can join our mailing list here to explore further.
How can your programme inform and support key stakeholders in regeneration and investment in the built environment - eg developers, local authorities and community groups?
We have developed a recipe card and booklet which outlines the work that has already been done and shares our method and set of ingredients for creating bespoke recipes to create healthier happier places. I often describe this as a ‘way of doing’ and it is very much values based. It’s not a checklist or a prescriptive technique as there’s not one recipe that fits all, and it’s certainly not to compete against any of the other fantastic toolkits and work that is happening in other parts of the UK and beyond. But I do hope that it can add to this healthy placemaking agenda in a positive and meaningful way.
Places are brought alive by the people in them and joy can be sparked through novelty and creativity which can be facilitated by buildings and the spaces that surround us - how dull would our lives be with the same recipe repeated in every book? To achieve this, we need to understand and respond to people’s experiences of places. Our built environment can hugely influence and contribute to these every day experiences, and have the power to nourish and nurture, or neglect and suppress.
My one hope would be that physical/mental health and wellbeing in the built environment is no longer considered an afterthought or an ‘added value’ (unfortunately a phrase I have heard several times) and that participation from citizens is more embedded in the design and redesign of spaces. If health and wellbeing is one of the core elements for decisions within the regeneration and developments sectors, from brief making stage through to detailed design stage and implementation, it has a natural ripple effect outwards to the economy too. The TCPA in 2017 stated that this type of approach can result in an increase in development value between 5-50%. Healthier happier people are more engaged in civic society, in work, and in their homes. If we work towards getting this right together, everyone benefits.
If you’d like to get in touch with Rachel, her contact details are here:
Dr Rachel Turnbull
Twitter: https://x.com/LeapOfFaith_RT
Clare Delmar
Listen to Locals
5 February 2025
