Royal Docks Team looking for a consultant to work on Inclusive Framework for Royal Docks Originals 2027

The Royal Docks Team (RDT) is looking for a consultant to work with us to create an Inclusive Practice Framework for our upcoming biennial festival, Royal Docks Originals.

Royal Docks Originals is the area’s flagship cultural festival supporting and showcasing cultural and creative projects made here. A biennial festival, Royal Docks Originals, is being created throughout 2026/27 and will be presented in autumn 2027.

Royal Docks Originals has four guiding principles:

1. It’s a movement, not just a moment: creatives, communities and organisations from across the Royal Docks work together to make the festival - supporting community cohesion and the ongoing growth and enrichment of the Royal Docks cultural ecosystem.
2. Original work made here: the festival commissions and showcases culture and creative industries made in the Royal Docks
3. By and with the community: residents, workers and students are invited to take part – creatively and as Festival team members
4. Inspired by and rooted in the Royal Docks: all projects respond to the area’s iconic land and waterscape and its diverse communities.

Royal Docks Originals (RDO) 2027 will have several thematic stimuli which are relevant to Royal Docks people and places, and which are current to the festival year. For the 2027 edition, one of these inspirations will be The Wake which will be unveiled at London Museum Docklands in summer 2027. This new sculptural memorial will honour enslaved Africans who were trafficked as part of the transatlantic slave trade, and their descendants. Other festival themes relate to transition and developments in the area.

Context for the Framework

Royal Docks Originals is a festival rooted in the stories and communities of the Royal Docks. As a programme that explores the area, including its complex histories - which encompass the legacy of global trade and the transatlantic slave trade - we are committed to ensuring that everyone can participate, contribute and benefit safely regardless of background, identity or circumstance. We want to create an inclusive practice framework that supports this intention.

For the full brief and to apply: Download the brief [PDF 1mb]