Join the Chica Coop Collective's fundraiser for Canopy Housing, and exclusive zine launch of “The Leak”: a faux art exhibition staged in a damp, mouldy, leaky bedroom in Hyde Park, in celebration of all that ‘LS6 Landlords’ have so generously contributed to the local cultural scene.

Whilst the celebration is satirical, and the exhibition imagined, “The Leak” was a very real hole in our roof with a very real insight into the national housing and rental crisis.

With this zine, we invite you into our most personal space, our home. Join us in poking fun at the exclusivity of both the arts and housing markets. Share your own similar horror stories about rats in the basement, or pigeons in the roof. After all, it is vital that we build solidarity in the fight for increased renters' rights, housing reform, and better regulation of rogue landlords - all before the roof caves in.

So welcome in! Make yourself at home. The damp has already. Amongst the debris of our water-damaged memories, we hope “The Leak” might make this shared experience of exploitative and expensive renting in LS6 more visible, and raise money for a local charity who offers alternative, affordable homes in Leeds.

Copies of the zine will be available during the launch on Saturday 10th August at Hyde Park Book Club for a pay-as-you-feel donation to Canopy Housing. Free entry, 7pm, just turn up.

If you can’t make it on the night, make a donation here instead!

Instagram: @thechicacoop

Facebook: Event page

Canopy Housing is a charity started and still based on Burley Lodge Road. They use a ‘self-help’ housing model to provide decent, sustainable, affordable accommodation for people that are homeless or in housing need in Leeds. With their tenants and volunteers, Canopy renovates empty and derelict houses that have been standing empty for years, and transforms them into homes. In doing so, they build not only social housing, but skills, regeneration, and networks of community support.