every town is a crafty town
The crochet club for knitters (or the knitting club for crocheters) is back and will be on this Sunday at the Cornerhouse cafe. Whether you knit, crochet, knot, embroider, so long as you can fit it in your bag, you’re welcome to join Pins n Needles in their pin and needle based adventures.
We’re meeting at 1pm on the 1st floor of the Cornerhouse on the 1st of April. Don’t be an April fool, come and play with yarns and make something amazing.
Ikea, the staple of every student home. I’m sitting here in my living room with dining table and chairs, a coffee table, shelving and a cd rack all from Ikea (the coffee table is the landlord’s, the rest is mine and my partner’s). It’s functional, cheap and not horrific looking, but those very same factors mean that 50% of my friends have at least two items of furniture the same as mine. Which is all very well, but I hate it even when they have the same shoes as me, never mind the same home decorating.
That’s why I LOVE Ikea Hacker. The dress from Ikea’s Belinda fabric is adorable and I would definitely wear it (my talented and charming friend Karina Jean was the first person who made me start looking at furnishing fabrics for making clothes, I am just finishing a skirt made from pear printed curtain fabric). I am actually in love with fabric I think and the Belinda fabris is very loveable. I might have to go to Ashton to declare my love. And buy enough for cushions (or a dress).
My bed is also Ikea, but I broke one of the headboard panels about 5 years ago, when I kicked it (bedroom karate, more hazardous that you think !) if I can’t fix it with the wonderglue I bought last week, I might just do my own Ikea hacking and make a big soft headboard instead. I’ll have to talk to my partner in love and crime and see what he thinks. If I do it, I’ll be sure to post pictures.
I was thinking this morning on my way to work how exciting all the craft fairs that go on. Felt Club, Bazaar Bizzare, the Bust Craftacular and Crafty Wonderland. I’ve never attended any, I just visit vicariously through pictures and write ups.
I’ve always felt quite sad that the same things didn’t seem to happen here. There are still plenty of traditional craft fairs going on, and these can sometimes be a source of unexpected excellent finds as well as a hiding the odd piece unintentional kitsch or retro crafting, but you can only take so many pine-cones fashioned into hedgehogs before you start wondering just how easy it would be to start making crocheted toilet roll ladies and if there is good money in it.
I even wondered if I should take the initiative and see if I could start one. Then I realised that with the project I am trying to start, Pins N Needles (the knitting club for crocheters or the crochet club for knitters), my own craft desires and well, that whole having a job, needing to sleep thing, it was unlikely.
When I got to work, I procrastinated by clearing out old emails and what did I find but an 17 month old email from my friend V, with a link to Craftermath a great website with a much f/punnier name than my own. As well as planning a whole host of craft fairs across the UK, there’s also a blog, a forum and heaps of links to loads of UK crafters.
It’s lovely to find that out there, there are plenty of crafters busily working away in the craft underground to create amazing items that you migh actually, you know, wear or have in your home. I hope that once the secret crafty project gets of the ground, I’ll be able to tempt some of these crafters over to the streets of Manchester
One of my favourite shops in Manchester, in fact probably anywhere, is Fred Aldous. It’s this amazing craft shop in a basement just at the edge of Piccadilly Gardens.
It stocks just about everything you can imagine for crafting, from beads to felt to paints, canvases, mosaic tiles, feathers and plaster. I love it. The stock is really well considered and clearly arranged, but there is always this feeling that you’re going to stumble on an amazing little treasure.
And that’s just what happened recently. I went in to buy some more Fimo (I’ve rediscovered how much I love it in the last few weeks) and I found a fantastic selection of glues ! It’s something that I never really think about until I am trying to stick one thing to another.
Glue, although essential is just nowhere near as exciting or visually appealing as beads or fabric or yarn or embroidery threads. With the other items you can immediately start appreciate the future projects, play around with colour contrasts and textures and just enjoy the sheer visual feast.
In comparison glue just can’t compete . As a consequence, I admit I tend to forget about it completely with the end result that some of my crafty projects have been stuck with bog-standard UHU glue (and even Pritt Stick). I can tell you that neither of these make for a happy crafter or long term project. Ever tried sticking plastic to metal with UHU ? I have, and whilst it’s fun to pull all the glue off as the project comes apart yet again, that’s not really the project I was aiming for.
I’m afraid of epoxies, the smell, the mess, the mixing. So I was super happy to find Crafter’s Pick Ultimate (or maybe that should be ULTIMATE). It works as straight up glue as well as a rubber cement and so far the two trials I’ve done with it have been great.I’ve used it on polymer clay and for gluing plastic buttons to earring backs. It’s reasonably priced too, which is even better when I’m crafting in the week after bills have been paid but before payday.
Glue, boring yet amazing.
Manchester is a large city in the North West of England. Or as Mrs Bonsall, my high school French teacher, would have it Manchester est une grande ville dans le nord l’ouest de l’Angleterre.
You probably know at least one thing that came out of Manchester. A council bye-law requires that I must mention The Smiths and Joy Division as well as the football teams. We didn’t just contribute to the worlds of sports and music. We also played a large part in developing the ideas of Fredrich Engels and Karl Marx. Engels wrote The Conditions of The Working Class in England based on the lives of Mancunian cotton workers during the industrial revolution
Manchester only really grew into a city during the industrial revolution. Manchester has the ideal climate (i.e damp and rainy) to spin cotton. From just one cotton mill in 1783, there were 108 in 1853. This part of Lancashire had always had many weavers both of cotton and wool, but industrialisation saw the population grow from 70, 000 in 1801 to 303,000 in just 50 years.
“Very interesting” you say “But what has this to do with crafts ?”
Well, Cottonopolis, as Manchester was known, was one of the first industrial cities in the world. The cotton mills saw work that was previously done by hand being moved to mass production levels. It was one of the first examples of skilled work being increasingly mechanised, making goods cheaper and more accessible. It was perhaps the first steps to the consumerist world we live in now, where good are increasingly produced by machine rather than hand and when traditional skills and craftsmanship began to lose their value.
I really love the idea of helping to grow a thriving craft scene in Manchester against this historical backdrop. Of creating a community where craftsmanship is valued, where taking time to produce a one off item is part of the process and the process is as enjoyable as the end product.
