Sensemaking Stewardship









Project Summary

Sensemaking Stewardship is a design-led research project by Loughborough University London, in collaboration with RCA’s Ecological Citizen(s) Network +, Thames 21, Love Our Ouse, and Surge Co-operative, that aims to bring the invisible labour of citizen-led ecological stewardship to light, narrating the story of a community's journey through negotiating land access and river rights through a series of illustrated booklets by Joey Yu.  











Sensemaking River Rights

Developed in collaboration with Love Our Ouse, a community-led, not-for-profit organisation working to protect and improve the health of the River Ouse and its tributaries in Sussex, Sensemaking River Rights tells the story of the UK’s river crisis and the potential of river rights to protect and restore freshwater ecosystems.

Through an illustrated narrative series, the booklet uses the river’s voice to unpack the often abstract and complex ideas underpinning what river rights are in an accessible way, and what this looks like in practice. It aims to connect the principles of river rights to the everyday relationships, responsibilities and collective actions involved in caring for rivers, while introducing the Charter of Rights for the Sussex Ouse, developed by Love Our Ouse, as a framework for rethinking our relationship with rivers and supporting community-led stewardship.
















Sensemaking Land and River Stewardship

Citizen-led land and river stewardship takes shape within complex and often uneven systems of ownership, governance, and access. In contexts characterised by fragmented land ownership and layered regulatory frameworks, communities must navigate not only material constraints, but also relational dynamics between power holders such as private and institutional landowners, councils, and funders.

Developed with Surge Co-operative, a not-for-profit, community-led cooperative based on the Channelsea River in Newham, East London, Sensemaking Land and River Stewardship is an illustrated narrative series tracing Surge’s stewardship journey along the Channelsea River. The illustrations aim to surface the legal, ecological, social, and relational complexities of stewardship, revealing the invisible labour through which these practices unfold.





Loughborough University London

EcoLandS