Spin A Yarn was an event designed, planned and executed for The House of Fairy Tales and South London Gallery as part of the gallery's opening of their extension in the summer of 2010. South London Gallery does a lot to reach out to the estate, Sceaux Gardens Estate, that lies immediately behind the gallery and they have a long running playworker residency scheme set up, our job was to kick off the next month of activities for the artist in residence and the theme of it had to be "string". Working with Annabelle Hartmann we explored different approaches and decided on using the phrase "to spin a yarn" as a starting point for a story-telling event, but not story-telling in the usual sense: We wanted the kids to tell us stories, so we set up a physical maze of string that would lead them around the park and expose them to different experiences that they could develop into stories. To make actually explore the maze, we constructed a framework that would make them interact with at least two characters and go on a quest. Obviously everyone didn't follow the thread, but that was fine and throughout the day it became increasingly difficult to make head or tails of the system as we encouraged some kids to become "spiders" and, using the balls of wool we had placed in "The Spiders' Nest" to obsure and obstruct the paths. This project included the coordination of several other artists and helpers as well as keeping the gallery up to speed and sourcing all the materials and refining them for the event - including making over 600 meter of chord using an electric drill. The mix of the practical and the planning is a pleasant one as you can mechanically make chord when your brain runs out of power. All photos by Erik Ekengren