About

I am one of the UK’s leading voices in co-creation and working with young people.

As the founder and artistic director of Company Three, a multi-award winning youth arts organisation in North London, I pioneered new ways of delivering and articulating the practice of co-creation with young people. This led to the development of more than 40 plays that platformed teenagers’ views on everything from how time feels to exam stress, the housing crisis, the future of our planet and why chicken shops are like pubs for kids.

At Company Three I co-created the “outstanding” (The Times), “remarkable” (The Guardian) and “game-changing” (The Stage) Brainstorm (Park Theatre/National Theatre/BBC) with ten teenagers, the neuroscientist Professor Sarah-Jayne Blakemore and co- director Emily Lim. Other major co-created work included The Future, When This Is Over (Yard Theatre), and Boat (Battersea Arts Centre). I also commissioned and directed work by more than 25 leading playwrights, including Inua Ellams, Alice Birch, Dawn King, Janice Okoh and Alexandra Wood.

Alongside making plays, I developed a programme of exchange and dissemination for Company Three around the practice of co-creation, including publishing Blueprints to support others to make their own version of our plays (more than 400 groups across the world have now made their own version of Brainstorm.) I trained more than 1,000 artists, youth workers and teachers through Company Three courses and university teaching at Goldsmiths, University of London, Guildhall School of Music and Drama and the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama.

During the pandemic I created the Coronavirus Time Capsule, a video record of the pandemic involving more than 3,000 young people from more than 300 groups in 17 different countries around the world that featured on national and international media and informed reports by the United Nations and Wellcome Trust.

During my time as Artistic Director/CEO, Company Three was recognised by the Spirit of London Awards and won the Peter Brook Empty Space Award for Innovation, the Stage Award for Community Project of the Year and Outstanding Drama Initiative award at the Music and Drama Education Awards. I was named in the Stage 100 most influential people in theatre from 2020-23, was an Artworks Fellow in association with the Barbican Theatre from 2013-15 and a Civic Futures Fellow from 2019-20. I co-led the process to successfully achieve Arts Council National Portfolio Status for Company Three in 2023.

Prior to founding Company Three, I created projects and plays for theatres including the Young Vic, Almeida Theatre, Southwark Playhouse, Theatre for a Change (Ghana), and many others.

After 15 years, I left Company Three in 2024, handing over the artistic director role to Nuna Sandy.

Bios

50 words: Ned Glasier is a leading voice in co-creation and work with young people. He was the founder and artistic director of Company Three, an award-winning theatre company working with teenagers from 2008-24. He works as an artist, consultant and trainer, supporting organisations to work in more purposeful and democratic ways with young people and communities.

100 words: Ned Glasier is a leading voice in co-creation and work with young people whose process is rooted in listening, collaboration and exchange. He was the founder and artistic director of Company Three, a multi-award-winning theatre company working with teenagers in North London. His work at Company Three included Brainstorm (National Theatre/BBC), When This Is Over (Yard Theatre) and The Coronavirus Time Capsule.

Having stepped down from his role at Company Three in 2024, Ned now works as an artist, consultant and trainer, supporting organisations to work in more purposeful and democratic ways with young people and communities.

200 words: Ned Glasier is a leading voice in co-creation and work with young people whose process is rooted in listening, collaboration and exchange. He was the founder and artistic director of Company Three, a multi-award-winning theatre company working with teenagers in North London, from 2008-24.

At Company Three his work included Brainstorm (National Theatre/BBC), When This Is Over (Yard Theatre) and numerous other plays and projects. In 2020, he created The Coronavirus Time Capsule, a video record of the pandemic involving more than 3,000 young people in 17 different countries.

Alongside play-making, Ned developed an extensive programme of exchange and dissemination around the practice of co-creation, including blueprints of C3 plays that have now been produced by more than 400 companies and training courses for more than 1,000 artists, youth workers and teachers. He has lectured at Goldsmiths, University of London, Guildhall School of Music and Drama and Royal Central School of Speech and Drama and was the the ArtWorks Fellow at the Barbican Centre from 2013-15 and Civic Futures Fellow from 2019-20.

“A leading force for change both for theatre and teenagers.”

- The Stage

“Company Three has pioneered a new standard of theatre with young people, combining agency with imagination and rigour … they are a beacon in our industry”

- Rufus Norris, Artistic Director, National Theatre