Where are the spaces for young people?

As someone who is fortunate to regularly be in spaces with young people, the recent reports of large groups of teenagers gathering in London, Birmingham and Milton Keynes are not a surprise.

These “link ups” are young people looking for IRL connection - to share physical space with each other.

It was the school holidays. Youth provision is patchy. Many young people are struggling to access paid work. There are very few free, safe spaces left for them to just exist in together.

Young people have always chilled in the streets, shopping centres and bus stops. What feels different now is the speed and scale. Social media and an AI generated invite can supercharge a moment of gathering into something much bigger, very quickly. A local hangout becomes visible, shareable, repeatable. And it spreads.

In my practice, creating work with, for and by young people, I’m constantly reminded that this isn’t about a lack of interest or imagination. There’s a lack of access - to space, to time, to each other, to being seen and heard.

When we do create those conditions - in rehearsal rooms, in schools, in theatres - the same bubbly energy we’re seeing in these “link ups” shifts. The running, screaming and fizzy excitement becomes collaborative, creative and generative. It’s young people arriving early, staying late, being joyous and trying to squeeze every last bit of connection out of being together.

This doesn’t remove the need to respond appropriately when things go wrong. But I think we need to pay attention to what this might be telling us. At its simplest, it speaks to something urgent: many young people are feeling disconnected.

If we want to respond well, we need to not just look at the behaviour, but start looking at the conditions around it.

Future Makers at NYT