ORANGE — The member-based makerspace and community workshop LaunchSpace recently announced its SocialRx program has been selected for multi-year support through the United Way of Franklin & Hampshire Region.
The award, $75,000 divided evenly over three years, will help LaunchSpace deepen and expand a program that uses creativity as a pathway to wellness and belonging for people across the region. SocialRx is a “social prescribing” platform founded in 2022 to address mental health and loneliness crises by connecting people with non-clinical, community-based activities involving the arts, culture, nature and movement.
LaunchSpace, inside the Orange Innovation Center at 131 West Main St., formally started its SocialRx program at the beginning of 2025. The hope is to eventually partner with area hospitals and community health organizations “so they can prescribe taking a class or getting a membership,” LaunchSpace co-founder and CEO Brianna Drohen said.
LaunchSpace works alongside the Franklin Regional Council of Governments (FRCOG), Heywood Hospital, Behavioral Health Network (BHN) and the Seven Hills Foundation to make creative programming accessible to the people each organization serves. The program serves people of all ages, backgrounds, abilities and income levels. A key part of it is a partnership with FRCOG, which will support LaunchSpace with data collection and analysis.
“The SocialRx at LaunchSpace is sort of a multifaceted thing. Our part is working on the new piece of it, which is expanding it to work with some new agencies,” said Jen Audley, FRCOG’s Community Health Improvement Plan (CHIP) coordinator. “We’ve been interested in SocialRx as a strategy for loneliness and isolation, which is a health issue.”
By working with LaunchSpace and its partners, FRCOG will help design participant and partner surveys, review findings and share results. Insight gathered over the course of the grant will help LaunchSpace refine its programming in real time, direct services to the communities that need them most, strengthen collaboration among partners and build tools that other organizations can use to sustain creative wellness programming across the region.
Participants can join structured creative workshops, use memberships for independent making, spend time in LaunchSpace’s community garden and take part in workshops held at partner sites. According to Drohen, programming is tailored to each group’s needs, creating opportunities to reconnect with creativity, support emotional well-being and build relationships with others.
Jenny Coeur, program director at the United Way of the Franklin & Hampshire Region, said she has already heard positive feedback.
“It’s a really exciting program,” she said of SocialRx. “The effects of the pandemic are still strong, including the isolation. That has a pretty significant impact on people’s health and wellness.”
According to the Massachusetts Cultural Council, SocialRx (originally launched under the name Art Pharmacy) formally debuted its arts-based social prescribing model in Massachusetts in June 2024. While the concept of prescribing arts, culture and nature for health benefits in Massachusetts first took off through early pilots around 2020, the formalized platform and third-party payer integration rolled out statewide in mid-2024.
“I’ve been following their work for a long time, because I was on the Cultural Council in Montague,” Audley mentioned.
Private practices and health systems (such as Mass General Brigham) have integrated social prescriptions supported through state and private framework pilots, often covered by insurance. That final component, Drohen said, has not reached western Massachusetts.
“We partner with social services organizations, agencies and individuals to provide creative experiences and programs to support mental health and well-being,” Drohen said. “The only difference is insurance doesn’t pay us; it’s funding through grants and fees for services.”
Organizations interested in becoming SocialRx partners, and community members interested in workshops, memberships or Mobile Makerspace visits, can contact Program Coordinator Erica Goulding at erica@launchspace-orange.com or 978-633-5131, ext. 103, or visit launchspace-orange.com.
