BUILDING BLOCKS Schools Challenge 2025: Designers of the Future

The pioneering BUILDING BLOCKS initiative, a collaboration between Newcastle Helix and the education sector, commenced its third year in 2025, along with the continuation of the 'Schools Challenge'.

The event ‘BUILDING BLOCKS Insights’ expanded across two days, welcoming 240 local Primary School children to the innovation district, to take part in STEM workshops in a real-life workplace. However, they were initially introduced to Helix through video, as part of the BUILDING BLOCKS Schools Challenge which wraps around the on-site event.

As Helix is all about the Future, the Year 5 students are asked to design a building of the Future that could be based at Helix. It would be somewhere the children and their families could live, or where people could work. The building could be any size, shape, colour and built from any materials.

The teachers, pupils and their families were initially introduced to the Helix site and the Schools Challenge via this video. It features Charlie Charlton, Community Engagement Manager at Helix:

The Helix team provided teachers with activity sheets for students to draw their designs on. Many added notes of their decision-making process, or descriptions of various structures that formed part of their building. The key of the Challenge is to let the children’s imaginations run wild.

Some of the 240 entries were designed using computers but most were drawn freehand and completed at home where their families could join the conversation. This has the added value of communicating to local communities about the life-changing work that’s taking place at Helix, as well as bringing to life the future opportunities on their doorstep.

The building managers from across the Helix site then gathered to judge the Schools Challenge submissions, scoring the designs to find a winner from each of the eight primary classes. Themes that emerged from the drawings were centred upon AI, space technologies, gaming and sustainability for the office buildings, and security, playfulness and community wellbeing for the home designs.

For 2025, the prize was a Mi-Box Live hybrid maths board game. Designed by a North East teacher-turned-inventor, it aims to do for numeracy what Scrabble did for literacy. It was a massive hit during the workshops at BUILDING BLOCKS Insights, which is great to see a local innovation go full circle.

One of the winners was Evelyn from St John’s Primary School. This was the moment when Helix Community Engagement Manager Charlie Charlton made the announcement to the full classroom:

Congratulations from Newcastle Helix to all the Year 5 students for taking part in the BUILDING BLOCKS Schools Challenge. The passion, ideas and talent were overflowing. Here’s a selection of the Judges’ Comments:

🧱 Wingrove Primary School Class 1 - “A well-zoned, safe space to play and thrive, and a great architectural design overall!” 

🎨 Wingrove Primary School Class 2 - “Lots of lovely things have been incorporated, a very thoughtful and colourful building!” 

🧁 Moorside Primary School Class 1 - “The Cake Building looks like a delicious place to work! When are we getting one here?” 

✨ Moorside Primary School Class 2 - “A magical, motivational design and a lovely reminder that we should all reach for the stars!” 

🔍 Walkergate Community School - “Very futuristic! A unique shape packed with design elements and even a red carpet included!” 

🚀 St John's Primary School - “An out-of-this-world design! Original, creative and functional - we really like the space theme.” 

✏️ Canning Street Primary School - “Very clever - a practical, considered design built to make it easier to study and learn, with good details!” 

🖼️ St Paul’s C of E Primary School - “Everything we would hope a building of the future to be, it encapsulates the aspirations Newcastle Helix represents!”