Handmade 2012 application form

Whooo!

This year is full of great events across the country, and we want to make sure that this year is another amazing year for Handmade!

So we have a very exciting announcement, this year Handmade goes from a one day fair, to a two day festival!

Yes! That’s right, this December on Saturday 1st and Sunday 2nd Winchester Guildhall will be a celebration of fantastic designer/makers.

Next week we will let you know how you can apply for the event, so keep watching out for further info, which you can find here, and on our facebook page.

Sadly there will be no July event this year, due to circumstances beyond our control, we cannot run the event, but it will happen in 2013!

So watch this space for more info, and hopefully some more exciting news!

Watch this space to find out more, and how you can apply!

2011 was our third year of running Handmade in Winchester, and I was very worried throughout the year on if Handmade could survive the current economic situtaion, by I guess I shouldn’t have worried! July is always tricky, and last year we had to take a different weekend, but in 2012 we are back to the Sunday of the Hat Fair weekend.

2011 was the best year for both sales and visitor numbers, it always takes time to build yourself a name, but I think the people of Winchester appreciate the quality, unique pieces and support the ethos of Handmade. We now need to maintain that and reach even more people, and further afield.

We are currently finalising the dates for Handmade 2012, but I can confirm that we will be running in July and December, watch this space for more details!

By 5pm about 6000 people had come through the door and met our 70 designer/makers, it was quite overwhelming at times, some of our makers had sold out of stock with an hour to go!

For the first time we had a third room too, the King Charles and Keats Rooms together, formed an wonderfully atmospheric room, with 21 unique designer/makers filling it.

The Wintonian Room had a mix of old hands and new sellers, and drew in the crowds.

In the Bapsy Hall you could barely move at times, but it was great fun.

In there you could find some more of our designer/makers taking part for the first time, like Hannah and Dan of the Hey Day Collective.

If you go to our Facebook page, you can find more photos of the event.

We also hope to keep updating the site with more bios of the people who took part, so if you came, you catch up with their latest work and news.

We will of course also let you know when our events will happen next year, all very exciting!

Thank you for making Saturday special for all of us!

A round up tomorrow, need to rest our legs and have food and beer!

WalkinArts

WalkinArts is a family based arts and crafts venture, specialising in unique custom hand crafted artistic products from Winchester.

The name is derived from our family surname (Walker) and the type of work the family produce (arts and crafts).
Our items are lovely hand-made and crafted gifts for family and friends or as a special deserved treat for yourself.

Items currently available include: exquisite hand turned wood crafts, original contemporary artwork, children’s kookie illustrations, cushions and fabrics, hand made cards for all occasions as well as other products.

You can find WalkinArts at their own site, and on Facebook.

Alice Shields

Alice loves to play with clay and enjoy the odd bit of drawing now and then so she decided to combine the two to create a range of unique ceramics for the house, garden or cardigan adornment.
Whether her house signs help you to locate the downstairs loo or plant labels show what’s in the veggie patch. To affirming your love of bird watching with her coasters and supporting environmental issues with her ‘Save the Bees’ badges or simply to garner a chuckle with my Crazy Alice Street range of badges; she hopes her whimsical designs make using her ceramics an everyday occurrence.

You can find Alice on Etsy, Wow, Thank You and on Facebook.

Bethany Athill

Bethany Athill is a textile designer/maker based in the beautiful city of Winchester where she trained and specialised in the traditional skill of handweaving.
With her simple vintage-inspired styling, she creates unique handwoven accessories for both men and women.
Bethany offers a diverse range of high quality, handwoven fabrics made with a varied mix of yarns, structures, colour palettes and textures, yet her designs are united by an elegant simplicity which runs throughout her work. In her more experimental weaving, she uses steaming and felting-to produce interesting three-dimensional forms and delicate textual fabrics.
Each product is a work of art, individually and lovingly handmade as part of a limited range or one of a kind. Bethany proudly offers her customers an exclusive product that is to be enjoyed and cherished on those special occasions.

Bethany has her own site, she is also on Not on the High Street and has a Facebook page.

Karen Turner

Karen Turner is a designer/maker based in South Northants. She completed a BA (Hons) Design Craft Degree in 2010 and specialises in unusual decorative ceramics, unique ceramic buttons and mixed media work that also incorporates ceramic elements. Her work is inspired by romance and nostalgia and all things vintage and she aims to give her work a sense of a forgotten history.

You can find out more about Karen at her website and on Etsy too.

Some more tomorrow!

Here are some more of our lovely designer/makers!

Julia Davey

Julia currently works from a small studio in Bath, Somerset next to the Kennet and Avon canal. She make small batches of earthenware ceramic items inspired by personal events, places and objects – one day it’s flamingos at the zoo and the next a bee trapped in her garden shed.

Her time is balanced between decorating tableware using original illustrations combined with decadent lustre and making jewellery, delicate butterflies and hand-formed coasters.

and… if you want to get technical about the company!

She is a qualified ceramicist and started her business in April 2009 as a part-time activity making items for her own pleasure whilst completing the final stages of a teaching training course.

During her work as a BTEC Fine Art Course Leader at Cirencester College that year, she gradually developed the range of shapes and patterns. With continued demand and expansion of stockists and online outlets, ‘Julia Davey Ceramics’ became her full-time occupation in July 2010.

Julia has her own site, she is on Etsy, Folksy, Not on the High Street and much much more. You can also find her on Facebook.

Julie Cushing

Julies papier mache birds and animals are made using recycled newspaper, tissue paper and wire .Each design is unique as they are not painted, but decorated using found patterns from newspapers.

You can find Julie on Folksy.

Bella Bobbin

Bellabobbin hand craft accessories and decorations that are perfect for Little People (and have also been known to prove irresistible to Big People too!). They have all manner of items from wooden pictures and appliquéd hoops to toadstool bunting and sweet birdie bookends. Bella Bobbin is a Veritable Emporium of Goodies!

You can Bellabobbin on Folksy, Wow, Thank you and they have a Facebook page too.

Amy Neal

Amy Neal is CoCo Crafts – Handmade handbags, purses, accessories and baby gifts all using bright and modern fabrics and lovingly made from her home in Berkshire.

Amy has her own site, she is on Folksy and Facebook.

More tomorrow!

Maria Smedstad

Stilt Bills of Winchester is a project set up in 2011, by accomplished writer, illustrator and artist Maria Smedstad.
Inspired by the rich wildlife around the River Itchen in Hampshire, the Stilt Bills are a collection of unique and highly decorative, handcrafted birds for sale from Smedstad’s Winchester home, as well as from local Pop-Atelier Gallery
Smedstad was born in Sundsvall, Sweden and moved to England in 1994. She went on to do a BA in illustration at University College Falmouth, graduating with a first class degree in 2001. She is best known for her autobiographical cartoon Em, which featured daily in thelondonpaper between 2006-2009.

Her Stilt Bill website is here, it also has it’s own shop here, and you can find out more about Marias other work here.

Mummy Makes

Liz Usher is a reformed Graphic Designer who now has much more fun making, packaging and labelling Fudge from a kitchen deep in Farnham, Surrey. Obsessed with labels, little bags and coloured twine, Liz’s creations have evolved into related areas – the kitchen table is also awash with greeting card and mini textile bunting-making operations. Keeping it seasonal, Liz is always inventing new flavours and re-inventing old ones inspired by customers and visitors to the stall.

You can find out more about Liz and Mummy Makes here.

Margo Chamberlain

Margo Chamberlain first got involved in hats in working for Hatters in London, making Beefeaters and the Lord Mayor’s hat, she also worked for a former milliner to the Queen. She now makes individual hats to order for weddings, the races or any special occasion. Clients can have a hat or headpiece designed around their outfit and find a style to suit them. Margo is based in Hook, Hampshire

You can find Margo on Etsy.

Lorriane Berkshire-Roe

Since completing a BA (Hons) degree in Graphic Design/Illustration from Canterbury College of Art in 1989, Lorraine has had a varied and interesting career, she was a self-employed papier maché artist in the early nineties, making many personal commissions and selling her papier maché creations at various outlets including local Art/Craft Galleries in Hull, Camden Market and a concession shop in Harvey Nichols in London to name but a few. Harvey Nichols photographed one of her larger pieces which was then used to advertise the Home furnishing dept on the routemaster buses for Christmas 1994.
After a brief spell training to be an adult education teacher she landed a great job as a full-time illustrator in a packaging company in Chipping Norton where she worked for nearly 9 years. After leaving there in 2005 with computer illustration skills to add to her traditional skills, she embarked on a freelance illustration career, and also rekindled her love of papier maché. She also currently is endeavouring to find a way to combine my love of plants, sculpture and gardens into my working life as an illustrator and papier maché artist, she is a work in progress!

You can find Lorraine on Etsy and on Facebook too.

More tomorrow!