The Carribbean Connections Creative Partnership Case Study
This case study explores what sustainable co-production can look like in practice. It also gives an example of how processes can support (or hinder) co-production with Museums Galleries Scotland explaining the structural changes that are needed to support co-production.
Building and maintaining relationships
The Caribbean Connections Creative Partnership project built upon the award-winning ‘Parallel Lives, Worlds Apart’ transatlantic slavery project at Paxton House (2020-22), developed by Paxton House curator Dr Fiona Salvesen Murrell, in partnership with Descendents Children’s Charity.
Artist and filmmaker Billy Gérard Frank conceived the ‘Bridging Borders’ educational and film project in collaboration with Fiona Salvesen Murrell as part of the exhibition Palimpsest at Paxton House, in partnership with Descendants Children’s Charity, the Edinburgh Caribbean Association, and the Caribbean Institute for EcoLiberation.
Partners:
Grenada: Zoe Smith of the Caribbean Institute for EcoLiberation; Bonair Government School; Dr John Angus Martin
England: Margaret and Chantel Noel and the team of Descendants Children’s Charity
Scotland: Lisa Williams, Leilani Taneus-Miller, Rod Penn, Jeda Pearl Lewis, Dr Désha Obsorne, Dr Peggy Brunache; Jacob Ross and the team and members of Edinburgh Caribbean Association.
Caribbean Connections has been shortlisted for the Historic Houses Frances Garnham Education Award.
The project aimed to:
- Explore connections between Paxton House and the Home family and Grenada from 1764 to present day and raise awareness of this history
- Bring new understanding to families that are part of the African Caribbean diaspora
- To explore rich new research and resources, and develop a new understanding of the place that Paxton House holds in the history of the trans-Atlantic slave trade
- Work together with different groups and communities to create relationships that promote longevity, power sharing, and equity
- Inspire a sense of pride and accomplishment in the young people and older generations of the communities with which Paxton House are cooperating
- Build on work with partners and communities in new, sustainable, ways to create long term educational resources, new partnerships, and develop the skills of all involved through training, workshops. exhibitions, and events
Paxton House received a grant of £40,000 from Museums Galleries Scotland. Descendants are volunteer run and do not have paid staff. They put hundreds of volunteer hours into this project, as did the other partners.
Know your History
At the core of this relationship between Paxton House and community partners is an acknowledgment of the history that connects Paxton House with the lives of enslaved people during the transatlantic slave trade.
Descendants have a principle that they apply when working with projects that reflect on slavery. “Any projects that we deliver that reference slavery never begin with slavery, and this was no exception. We did a lot of work examining life in Ghana, the family, the community, art, culture etc before European involvement so that the children understood that the people were humans just like themselves with their own hopes and dreams before they were enslaved. They understood the devastation caused by enslavement on the individual, the community and were able to empathise.”
How could your museum apply this principle to exhibitions/interpretation that reference slavery?
Some examples from the Scottish museum sector include:
- The work done at Glasgow Life to reinterpret and redisplay The Glassford portrait at Kelvingrove Museum and Art Gallery after discovering the presence of a young black child, enslaved by John Glassford, standing behind him and his family.
- The work done at Cromarty Courthouse in their exhibition ‘Slaves and Highlanders’ which recorded the role of Highland Scots in the slave trade and slave plantations of the Caribbean and South America
- The work done at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery in their exhibition The Remaking of Scotland, particularly this feature by Lisa Williams of the Edinburgh Caribbean Association.
- The word done at Angus Alive to reinterpret their World Cultures Collection with examples such as The Thuggee.
To find out more about Paxton House’s links to slavery, you can visit the website Caribbean Connections – Paxton House or visit the ‘Caribbean Connections’ exhibition at the House.
‘I want to commend the Trust for acknowledging Paxton House's role in the history of slavery and for meaningfully involving the communities whose ancestors were directly impacted. You are setting an important example for other stately homes to reflect on their own histories and take steps toward giving back. I truly appreciate what the Trust is doing to recognise the past while fostering cross-cultural understanding and dialogue. It’s a powerful and necessary step forward.’
Collette Noel of Descendants
Co-production (the joy)
Key outcomes of the partnership include:
- Deepened understanding of Paxton’s links to transatlantic slavery
- Centring Caribbean communities and shifting the narrative
- Strengthening cross-community and cross-country relationships
- Enhanced creative and cultural outputs
- Increased sense of belonging and representation at Paxton House
- Enhanced institutional confidence and capacity for decolonisation
- Platform for honest cross-cultural dialogue
- Increased visibility and awareness among wider audiences
- Meaningful educational impact
- Lasting legacy through exhibition and interpretation
- Shared learning on the practicalities and challenges of international co-production
Caribbean communities, including those living on the former Waltham Estate in Grenada, were placed at the heart of the project’s interpretation and storytelling.
This shift in perspective enabled:
- more authentic, lived-experience-led narratives,
- a reclamation of agency in telling the story of trans-Atlantic slavery, and
- a power rebalancing in how histories are framed and communicated.
Participants reported feeling “seen”, acknowledged, and represented at Paxton House.
Co-production (the recommendations)
Based on their learnings from the challenges of working in a co-productive way Paxton House have developed recommendations for their future co-production work which include:
Co-production requires time, flexibility and realistic resourcing
- Build extended lead-in time for relationship-building, joint planning, and shared decision-making.
- Allocate flexible contingency budget and time to accommodate inevitable change.
- Set clear but adaptable milestones, revisited collaboratively at regular intervals.
Clear governance and communication structures are essential
- Establish clear governance early on, including defined roles, responsibilities, and decision-making processes.
- Implement agreed communication channels, with expectations around responsiveness and information sharing.
- Use regular check-ins or partnership meetings to maintain alignment, surface concerns early, and support shared problem-solving.
Transparent budgeting supports trust and avoids perceptions of competition
- Present a transparent budget breakdown to all partners at the outset, including contingency lines.
- Revisit budget allocations collaboratively at key milestones to avoid misunderstanding.
- Where cuts or reallocations are necessary, communicate openly and involve partners in prioritisation decisions.
Co-production builds powerful relationships and outcomes, but requires long-term commitment
- Develop a long-term co-production strategy with partners, including joint priorities for future work.
- Seek multi-year funding where possible to sustain relationships and deepen impact.
- Maintain active communication with partners between projects to preserve trust and continuity.
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Supporting co-production
This project was funded through the Delivering Change: Sustainable Co-production Fund. It achieved strong engagement and innovation but there were challenges around funding, capacity, and coordination which highlights the need for deeper structural and financial support for future co-production projects. In this section the MGS Grants Team share their reflections and what as funders MGS has learnt.
The £40,000 grant made to Paxton House was one of five grants made to museums who already had some experience of participatory practice with communities who had faced systemic exclusion. When they applied, they had already established a relationship with the partner they would go on to work with and had drafted a partnership agreement. Unlike most applications to MGS, the projects and the costs were not fully developed at the time of award; this was developed during the project. Another difference was that the awards were decided by a panel of three people, including an external person who had experience working with systemically excluded groups.
We asked the museums to meet up three times during the grant period as a “learning cohort” to share and discuss the challenges and successes of the work. At the third meeting the community partners came too.
There have been many learnings for the project including:
- Community input needed to start earlier during the programme development
- We asked the museums and community partners to do a lot of work before the awards were made. Drafting the partnership agreement was a big piece of work. It would have been fairer to provide an incubator grant for this
- We should have had the community groups at all the learning cohort meetings as their input at the third one was very valuable
- The grants were not big enough to cover the ambition of the projects
