The Active Ingredients project has been developed jointly by Aesop and BOP Consulting. It aims to deepen our understanding of the ways in which arts interventions in health and social contexts actually work – and to improve the ways these are designed and their impacts measured. This short paper:

• outlines the background and need for the project
• documents the process of how it has been developed
• presents and describes the initial Active Ingredients planning and evaluation model, and
• suggests how it can be used in practice.

BOP Consulting (2018). Active Ingredients: the Aesop planning and evaluation model for Arts with a Social Purpose. UK:Aesop.