Sheerwater rediscovered!

Since 2014, the Sheerwater housing estate near Woking, in Surrey (UK), has been the subject of a partially completed regeneration project which is negatively affecting residents and despite some achievements. 

The regeneration project was stopped due to Woking Borough Council facing financial difficulties. At the end of 2025, some decisions were announced to refurbish dwellings that had already been vacated. Others were to be sold for redevelopment.     

December 2025 Map of Sheerwater planned refurbished/completed/to sell dwellings

(courtesy of the Mascot Hub) 

The Systemic Life Stories Project

I have been a regular visitor to the Sheerwater Parkview community centre since 2015.  In 2025 and after a very intersting conversation with a university colleague, I decided to apply for funding to organise a research project with Sheerwater residents and organisations. 

I partnered with the MascotHub (a partnership that provides aid and advice to residents) and the SurreyHistory Centre (a council sponsored organisation with more than 16 million historical records about Surrey). I recruited Dr Cecilia Loureiro from the Business School and Isabelle Kemp from the Social Science Impact Accelerator team. The project effectively ran between July and December 2025, with a main exhibition-workshop event on the 29th of October.  

 

Mr Paul Salt (left), resident of Sheerwater for 61 years being interviewed at the Mascot Office (September 2025).

 

With the help of partner organisations and personal contacts, I interviewed residents for their life stories. Using the systems thinking rich picture technique, with the information obtained from the interviews we (myself and Cecilia) produced and disseminated a visual history of Sheerwater as told by residents.  

A history of Sheerwater

We organised the picture (see above) into three (3) stages:  a ‘past’ (of resilience), a ‘present’ (of diversity) and a ‘future’ (of hope). In a nutshell, the past shows a community where people cared for each other.  The present shows the arrival of diverse community groups, supported by new facilities and by social media communication.  The reader can zoom in in the picture above for more detail.  

The future of Sheerwater

The future of Sheerwater as perceived by residents, is about building bridges between different community groups or constituencies.  

Participants at the "Sheerwater Rediscovered!" event, October 2025, Surrey History Centre. 

There are challenges and opportunities to do so.  A key challenge is to facilitated inter-group communication and understanding.   One opportunity to address this challenge as proposed by participants at the main project event (pictured above) is to design disseminate a welcome pack and restablish a community newsletter.  

During 2026, this possibility has been mentioned to representatives from some Sheerwater organisations.  There could be scope to do so, provided that there is an adequate form of leadership to take it forward, and that an appropriate format (i.e. electronic or other) is agreed between interested parties.

Hope for the future

We (myself included) are to 'move on' from what Sheerwater was: a fantastic, a very happy time (as told by many residents).  We are now in the present where, according to the philosopher Bying Chul Han (2024), it is still possible to act with hope and despite a sense of despair: to do something meaningful, to do something for others, spontaineously or in improvised forms.  To be open to possibilities as we do when we 'dream'; to positively turn to each other (positively), to trust in each other, and search for those possibilities together.  

The hope, paraphrasing the philosopher Byung Chul Han (2024) is for Sheerwater residents and groups to be open to accept that the future is uncertain, and that hope "increases our sensibility for what-is-not-yet, on which we have no direct influence" (p.27).  

With hope, the future becomes then up for the taking.  Let's try to infuse a good sense of hope in Sheerwater.  As we do when we cheer the Sheerwater Football Club team:

Come on Sheers!, Up the Sheers! 

Reference

Han, B. C. (2024). The spirit of hope. John Wiley & Sons.

Note

Further details about the event and the project “Systemic Life Stories for regeneration:  Helping Sheerwater” can be seen at: 

https://pure.royalholloway.ac.uk/en/projects/systemic-life-stories-for-regeneration-helping-sheerwater-social-/, accessed April 2026