Hello to all the lovely new faces! I’m Anna & I run the Love Makers Craft Cafe. Thanks a million for all the love since we kicked off just 6 weeks ago(!) It’s honestly blown me away.
It’s also high time for me to introduce myself (which I find uncomfortable, so please bear with me…)
1. I have no formal art school training, but I did a LOT of art at school
2. Pottery has always been my Thing, but honestly just making anything at all makes me really happy and I’m quite good at it
3. I’ve lived on boats for much of my adult life: on a 65ft narrowboat in central London as a student and then (after a long, land-locked hiatus), starting a family on an 100yr old old, 27m Dutch luxe-motor barge on the tidal Thames
4. My dad was an engineer and taught me to solder/ saw/ glue/ sail/ put up a Bedouin tent/ find my way around a toolbox/ be curious/ create with confidence
5. I’m left-handed. It’s a gift, because we have to think about things both ways round to truly understand them
6. I was brought up abroad, which has given me a useful sense of perspective through my life
7. I get itchy fingers when I’ve not made something for a few days. Literally.
8. I really love making spaces for people to come together. LMCC was born (in part) from a belief in community and genuine, IRL connection
9. I’ve seen the science and drunk the Koolaid: making with our hands triggers dopamine and the effort-reward cycle and generally makes us really happy.
10. My chaos brain can’t stick to one thing for long when there’s so much in the world to explore.t LMCC gives you the opportunity to choose something new each time you come, with zero judgement or expectations.
11. Turns out I don’t have many recent pics of myself! This is old- you’ll have to imagine the extra laugh lines
12. I am making this up as I go along (and squeezing it in between “proper” freelance marketing work, a family, and two very needy cats). Given how long I’ve admired and envied other women who seem to do this so effortlessly I am surprised & chuffed to bits to be here. Hope to meet some of you soon ❤️
Did you know about @lovemakerscafe in Bath?! It’s the cafe where crafting IS the menu🤩. And is sososo much fun. It has started to pop-up in various locations around the city (they are currently doing sessions in @wolf_wine ⚡️) and have heaps more planned for the rest of the year. Follow them on insta to be kept updated on when they do their next pop-up.
It’s a busy time of year, so it’s hard to make time for ourselves - but make time we must. Sink or swim! I’ve made these as flexible as I can so you can choose how many/ which ones work for you. If a couple of hours of time to yourself learning a gentle, absorbing manual skill sounds like the restorative pause you need, drop me a line and come along. It’s girt lush, I promise ;)
realised I’d not been very clear about this (classic)…
You do NOT have to sign up for a full 6-week course - picknmix your faves…
Or just come to one!
Each class is completely self-contained. We do something different every week, so you can dip in wherever you fancy.
No sewing experience needed (most people start from scratch).
All materials included. Tea, biscuits, nice people.
Bath + Frome
Morning + evening options
Full deets online ☝️
DM me or email [email protected] to book💙 🧵
A week of sashiko & whitework embroidery coming up! Can’t wait - a few spaces left, so join me if you can…
🌺 @vallis_farm 9.30-11.30 this Friday (#visiblemending week1: sashiko)
🐻 #bearflat 7.30-9.30pm on Tuesday 5th (embroidery week1: whitework)
🔭 @brlsi 7.30-9.30pm Wednesday 6th (Sashiko project wk1- what this demo is for)
🐻 bear flat, Thursday 7th 7.30-9.30pm (visible mending wk1: Sashiko)
This is a playful experimental combination of various different #sashiko stitches + some #intuitivestitching; I wanted to do the MilkyWay from the Arabian desert at sunset. We used to go camping when I was a kid and these are some of the stars my dad taught me: Cassiopeia, the Pleiades, the big dipper, Orion’s Belt with red Betelgeuse. I’m debating adding Venus an Haley’s comet - what do you think? We had big Bedouin tent we usually camped with, but one special night we drove out into the sand dunes and slept outside with no tent at all so we could see it passing overhead. I fell asleep to the grownups singing around the campfire to my dad’s guitar. Not sure I ever did actually see the comet, but it surely wasn’t for a lack of stars ✨
Craft, Creativity and Connection - a restorative day of crafting, delicious food, wildswimming in the natural pool and a wood-fired sauna experience
🌿🌷 in the beautiful surrounds of @vallis_farm
🗓️Friday 12th June
🕙10am-3:30pm
📍Vallis Farm
🏷️£96 includes all craft materials, food and sauna/pool experience
✂️Anna @lovemakerscafe will guide you in your choice of block printing, crepe paper flower making or botanical embroidery.
🍽️After a delicious Vallis lunch, lovingly made for you with ingredients from the farm,
🏊♀️Tara @wildswimmingwoman will support you in a delightful wild swim session to welcome the summer solstice.
We will also enjoy the wood fired sauna and end with tea and cake.
🌀FLOW of the Day🌀
Welcome
☕As everyone arrives, we will welcome you with a hot (or cold) cup of something delicious and a first look at the beautiful gardens of Vallis Farm
*Craft Cafe*
We will settle around the long table in the main house for a couple of hours of crafting - choose from block printing, botanical embroidery, or paper flower making
*Lunch Break*
*Wild Swim and Sauna*
Time for a dip and a laze in the great outdoors. If it’s your first wild swim, Tara will guide you through - Vallis Farm’s wild pool is a natural haven with beds either side teeming with nature.
*Home Time*
After a relaxing and restorative day, it’s time to say goodbye and make your way gently back to the real world, with your fabulous creations of course!
Booking link in Instagram bio
Or head straight to /book
Learn a bit of sashiko, a few cool darning techniques, embroidery and patching with me in Frome or Bath this May, and give your wardrobe a whole new lease of life…
Starting @vallis_farm on Friday mornings from 1st May and at #BrutonAveCommunityHall #BearFlat on 7th May - full details @ link in bio 🙌
I made a pair of trousers!!! I’ve had a machine for years, but always struggled with the precision aspect of #dressmaking🤣 and the huge investment (and risk) it takes to make something from 2d sheets of paper into a 3d garment that not only fits but actually makes you feel good… Cue: @bristolsewing #bristolsewingschool
J gave me a “make a toile of your favourite garment” day course for Xmas, and it was brilliant! Emma has been teaching machine sewing for over 10yrs and what she doesn’t know isn’t worth knowing.
I was that annoying person who turned up with my own cotton, because if I’m going to make a toile (say it “tw-ull”) that actually fits, I know I will want to be able to wear it - otherwise it will make me cross every time I look at it. (I know that’s not the point, btw). The point of a toile is to make a “draft copy” in cheap fabric to make sure you’ve got the measurements right and can adjust/ correct anything before you start in earnest without fear of botching / wasting expensive fabric.
You make your amends to the toile and then correct the paper pattern pieces, so when it comes to making the actual piece in whatever lovely fabric you’ve found, you can be 💯 confident it’s going to sew like a dream and fit like a glove. The toile’s time is over once you’re happy the pattern is right.
In my brain: why make something UNwearable when you could make it wearable with some supercool printed cotton you’ve had lying around for literal decades, waiting for its moment to shine? Worst case: the toile is a disaster (but I still get a pattern out of it) and I just have to use the toile material for something else. But I backed myself: I reckon I can make a wearable (enough) toile. As you can see: I didn’t quite get time to finish the zip, but for someone who’s only ever sewed straight lines and struggled with the tension, I’m pretty chuffed! Emma’s got loads of classes making different projects -so if you’re tempted to brave the machine and see what you can do, take a look. 🙌
If #handsewing is more your vibe, I’ve just published some more courses in #visiblemending and #embroidery starting in May in Bath and Frome so check them out 🙌
Just as I’m gearing up to announce my first retreat… thanks @wsj obviously you’re completely right (also: NATURE!)
Take this as your sign from the inverse that you should definitely join @wildswimmingwoman and me @vallis_farm on 12th June for a day of creativity, delicious food, wild swimming and sauna in one of somerset’s best kept natural beauty spots… this one will nourish your soul in every way.
Book now - link in bio. Hope to see you there !
#creativeretreat #somersetretreat #wellbeingretreat #dayretreat
#hatamusubi is an old sashiko joining knot - otherwise known as a loop knot or a sheet bend - that enables you to join a short end of working thread with a new one super securely, so you can carry on stitching. Especially if you form the cross literally on the fabric, it can also save wasting any precious thread.
It takes a bit of practice and perseverance to get the hang of it, but it’s useful in all sorts of ways beyond #sashiko or even #embroidery, so why not give it a try…
Meet&Mend
Monday 9th March 6.30-9pm
@btpalfredstreet
It’s been a sashiko deep dive of a week for me this week… whatever’s in your pile, bring your mending challenges& conundrums tomorrow night and let’s solve them with cake and good company (never hurts, right?!) see you there x
I made these at the end of last year and never posted them… a paper folded ball and a brass tube himmeli icosahedron (with 20 faces - at the #baublebar we stuck to 8 which was tricksy enough!)
Next I want to try making the paper ball in a few different paper weights and sizes. It was so rewarding to make it come together in my hands. It still blows my mind how complex 3D shapes can emerge from a flat sheet of paper…!
(PS: My New Year’s resolution to try and finish more things before I start new ones is not going well, thanks for asking 😂)
