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By Will Saunders, Executive Producer, The People’s Piazza

David Olusoga's film, The People's Piazza: A History of Covent Garden, explores the captivating story of Covent Garden, revealing its hidden histories, and sharing how strong communities were forged around public space. In that sense, Covent Garden’s story is emblematic of many other public spaces across the country, and David’s film marks the conclusion of a project that, in 2022, he was an Executive Producer for - and that gave audiences a new sense of connection to place, and to one another.

Commissioned as part of , a festival of creativity and innovation, is the UK’s largest immersive storytelling project to date, with 15 different shows in towns and cities across the UK during Summer 2022.

From Swansea to Swindon, and from Lambeth to Lincoln, hundreds of different stories were told in augmented and virtual reality, with thousands of people in headsets, on history walks or experiencing an exciting new form of immersive cinema. Local libraries were turned into portals allowing audiences to travel through time and space to experience a new form of internet, one in three dimensions - and now more commonly known as The Metaverse.

With David’s support, 50 emerging producers were hired and trained by - the UK’s National Centre for Immersive Storytelling run by Royal Holloway, University of London and the National Film and Television School (NFTS). These young creatives were given access to the same TV and Film archives from the 麻豆约拍 and BFI that are featured in The People’s Piazza.

They used it to tell a variety of historical and lesser known stories that you can experience for yourself using the free .

Green Queen, and turn of the century environmental pioneer, Ethel Haythornwaite sits at the heart of the AR story in Sheffield, whilst in Blackpool, audiences can take a ride through the LGBT history of the town, and lose themselves in its drag capital, Funny Girls.

The underlying technologies that made the StoryTrails experiences possible were also deployed in the making of The People’s Piazza.

StoryTrails created virtual maps of 15 towns and cities across the UK, using 3D scanning technologies to build digital models of people, places and objects. These spatial 3D maps of Wolverhampton, Swansea and other UK towns and cities were then populated with hundreds of different animated stories, gathered from the people who lived there in a series of love letters to pubs, parks and places that really mattered to people.

These are stories that you can now see for yourself on the BFI’s .

These 3D modelling technologies were also used to generate the virtual Covent Garden you see in People’s Piazza, and to create an experience on set that allowed David, and other historians, to literally walk through history.

Watch The People's Piazza: A History of Covent Garden on Sunday 13th November, on 麻豆约拍 Two and iPlayer.