The UK Emerging Writer residency is  a new addition to the programme for 2015. The writer comes to Cove Park for two weeks and is given space and time to develop their ideas in a community of artists, along with the opportunity to make new contacts and meet others in the arts.

Sarah Shapiro was born in Chicago and now lives in London.

She is currently studying for her MA in Place, Environment, and Writing at Royal Holloway. Since graduating with a BA in Environmental Studies from Mount Holyoke College she has worked as a research associate for the Blue Mountains World Heritage Associate in Sydney, Australia, and has also trained and worked as a confectioner.

Her interests are centered in the exploration of the links between poetry and place, with a focus on physical and emotional landscapes as they interplay with experiences belonging and unbelonging. Sarah hopes to expand her study into research of women’s movement through urban, suburban, rural and remote spaces as a way of self narration, storying and place-making.