Welcome to the first in a series of blog posts offering a sneak peak at the this year’s line-up of performances, events, talks and workshops hosted by the School of Advanced Study during the Bloomsbury Festival.

We interviewed artist Alex Beeching and his team about the Orwellian Garden they are creating for the festival. Alex described his vision as creating a living blanket of plants, succulents and ferns… to subvert the pomposity and tyranny of the office.

He draws inspiration from 1984 by George Orwell and in particular quotes the following line – “If you want a vision of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face – forever.” In the full audio interview, released early next week, Alex explains his own act of subverting this vision by creating a river of shoes, some of which will be crowdsourced online.

We will release the full interview and Storify early next week. If you are interested in the Orwellian Garden or want to participate in the crowdsourcing activity for shoes (strictly no clogs allowed) follow us on Twitter via @SASNews.