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About Fflamingo

Fflamingo CIC is a Cardiff-based, multi award winning community interest company creating bold, inclusive and genuinely co-produced opportunities for people with learning disabilities, disabled people and LGBTQ+ communities.

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We use creativity, performance and shared exploration to help people express themselves, develop confidence, build relationships and have greater power and control over the things that affect their lives.

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Our work begins with a simple belief: every voice has the right to be heard – safely, creatively and proudly.

Creativity with purpose

We create spaces where people can explore who they are, take creative risks and make meaningful connections without being judged or underestimated.

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Coproduction is at the heart of everything we do, our people are not simply invited to contribute after decisions have already been made - they help shape what we do, how projects are delivered and what happens next. 

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This means our work can be joyful, challenging, thoughtful, ridiculous and transformative – sometimes all at once.

House of Deviant

Our flagship project, House of Deviant, is Wales’ first learning-disabled drag collective. Through weekly creative development, performance opportunities and individual support, our Queens explore drag, identity, character, movement, music, comedy and storytelling. .

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House of Deviant challenges assumptions about who gets to take up space, make decisions and be seen as a professional artist. Its work has been presented at venues and festivals across Wales, including Wales Millennium Centre, the Riverfront Theatre and Hijinx’s Unity Festival.

 

Independent evaluations have consistently found that participants experience increased confidence, independence and willingness to try new things. As one Queen put it:

“I’ve got the confidence to make my own decisions.”

LOVE SHACK

LOVE SHACK is our growing programme of creative, accessible work about sex, relationships, identity, consent and connection.

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People with learning disabilities are too often excluded from honest conversations about relationships or given information that focuses only on risk. LOVE SHACK creates a different kind of space: one where people can ask questions, share ideas, explore what matters to them and learn without embarrassment or judgement.

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The programme brings together creative workshops, social opportunities, accessible resources and training for professionals. Like all our work, it is shaped alongside people with learning disabilities, ensuring that their experiences, priorities and voices remain at its centre.

 

LOVE SHACK is not a counselling service. Where someone needs specialist advice or support, we help them connect with appropriately qualified organisations and professionals.

How we work

Across all our projects, we are committed to:

• genuine co-production and shared decision-making;

• accessible, creative and inclusive practice;

• recognising lived experience as expertise;

• creating safer spaces for honest exploration;

• supporting people to develop their own voices and make their own choices;

• challenging low expectations of disabled and LGBTQ+ people;

• learning, reflecting and adapting as our communities change.

 

We work with artists, facilitators, people with lived experience, community organisations, health and social care professionals, researchers and cultural partners. Together, we create work that is artistically ambitious, socially meaningful and rooted in the lives of the people involved.

Serious work. Fabulous people.

Fflamingo’s projects might involve drag queens, cabaret, games, costumes, performance, difficult conversations or a healthy dose of chaos. Underneath all of it is a serious commitment to inclusion, rights and lasting change.

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We do not create work for communities. We create it with them.

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That is where the magic happens.

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