Zoë Dennington is appointed Open City Education Director

Open City is delighted to announce that Zoë Dennington will join the charity as its new Education Director.

Zoë will join Open City in May to head up the charity’s growing education programme which now covers both London and Birmingham. 

Zoë brings more than 14 years of experience in the cultural sector to Open City’s leadership team as well as a long standing commitment to engaging and empowering young people through art, culture and creativity. She was formerly Head of Learning and Participation at the Crafts Council where she created a strategic approach enabling schools nationwide to access high-quality online courses and resources to get craft back into the classroom.

Additionally, she led the development of a learner-centred ‘Make First’ approach embedding anti-racist and anti-ableist practice into the organisation’s education programmes. 

Alongside this, Zoë also produced a ‘Young Craft Citizens’ initiative comprising programming, paid work experience and opportunities for young people to join the Craft Council’s Youth Advisory Panel and Board of Trustees.

As part of the Crafts Council’s senior management team, she has shaped organisational strategy and contributed to business planning and fundraising. In addition, she is also a member of the Board of Trustees for the Family Arts Campaign, helping to develop their aims, objectives and programme as part of Arts Council England’s Let’s Create national portfolio.

Incoming Education Director Zoë Dennington said: “The power of creative engagement to counter systemic inequality is central to my work and the opportunity, as Education Director at Open City, to apply this to the built environment, which shapes our lives so profoundly, is really exciting to me.”

Open City CEO Manijeh Verghese said: "We are delighted to have Zoë join the Open City team and look forward to learning from her rich experience across learning, participation and youth-led programmes. We look forward to making opportunities for young people to access careers in the built environment even more accessible and, in turn, empowering them to shape their cities and spaces.”

Zoë will join the organisation in May ahead of the end of this academic year, during which Open City’s Education programmes have grown in both London and Birmingham. Zoë is looking forward to building on these achievements to grow our programmes sustainably to reach more young people outside of cities, across the country and around the world.