BDN’s initial focus on development and training manifested in regular projects like Introducing…, ChoreoMatch and Production Lab which were produced to give artists the freedom to play, create, learn and perform. Weekly professional class has been the backbone of BDN’s offer and was fundamental in setting up Brum Pro Class, a city-wide multi-partner membership scheme for professional dance classes in the city.

Over the years our work as an artist-led network shifted in an attempt to acknowledge the broader struggles faced by dance artists already in or trying to forge a way into a sector which is notoriously competitive and exclusionary. We spent more time examining the systemic issues that deny us a truly reflective sector, that deny artists financial stability or affordability and that prioritise buildings and organisations over artists and the art they create. Out of this came an initiative to collectivise with more dance artists by establishing Dance Cooperative Birmingham  , an artist led organisation that is democratic, reperesentative and determined to create a new way for dance artists to thrive. Genevieve Say and Karen Wood, Birmingham Dance Network’s co-directors,  decided to close the organisation’s doors in 2025 so that they could focus on other projects, including being two of 10 directors of Dance Cooperative Birmingham.’