Ryla Dilkes: CRAFTBAR

CRAFTBAR is conceptualised and produced by independent maker Ry Dilkes in collaboration with Convenience using circular and sustainable practice to create this unique modular work space. The aim is to create an environment made from reclaimed materials that provides a space for participants to gain hands-on experience working with recycled materials and inspiring them to think about the ways materials could be recycled and reused on an individual level. 

Initially created for the Good Business Festival, this has been funded by the LCR Cares- Community Wealth Building Fund. To run a further 12 community sessions and work alongside our community. 

The framework was created with boards donated by FINSA.

Dripped Goods x Astles, Upcycling Costume Jewellery

Amy intitially did a pilot of this workshops for Ryla's Launch of the CRAFTBAR. After this though collaborated with musician and writer Astles, to run a CRAFTBAR workshop at Astles christmas gig at the unitarian church in Liverpool. 

Dripped Goods ran an up-cycling workshop exploring the reuse of costume jewellery and second hand garments.

The resulting workshop created a garment for Dan during the gig, with the audience contributing during the breaks and build up. 

Dan performed in this outfit at the end of the night! 

Experimenting with Recycled Materials with Alison Bailey Smith

Alison lead a workshop around making sculptural forms, pins and brooches from waste materials. Which took place to an audience of 50 people at the launch of the 2023 leg of the programme. Which we ran at Pilgrim Street Arts Centre.

“My craftwork is made from foraged urban materials - from my household waste, from the mechanics next door to the studio, washers pick up on walks. It always reflects changes - parts transformed from one original use to another, respecting the material's inherent nature rather than its original purpose. Metal, plastic, and fabric are combined to create distinctive structures. The motivation behind my work comes from being the child of post war parents, Scottish thriftiness and an avid watcher of Blue Peter! My need to re-use, re-develop and re-create can be seen in my wide use of ordinary materials with extra-ordinary results. My staple ingredient in my work is wire that I reclaim from old televisions, the older the better.”

Plastics Sculpture, Jackie Pease

Jackie lead a workshop where people will learnt how to iron together soft plastics such as carrier bags and bubble wrap to make and decorate flames for a collaborative comet sculpture. This is a skill you can use to make other items at home after the session e.g. pouches, book covers. This workshop took place at the CRAFTBAR launch event on Friday 24th March hosted at Pilgrim Street Art Centre.

“Hi – I’m Jackie. I’ve got to know about plastic reuse through my involvement with Plastic Tactics , a Liverpool-based CIC who aim to "encourage people to use and reuse plastic responsibly, through access to useful information, practical equipment and collaborative relationships."

Claire Henderson

Claire lead an introductory workshop around the skill of weaving on Wednesday 26th April at Pink Sands Studio.

Claire Henderson has delivered art and craft workshops across the Liverpool City Region over the years and founded Plush Crafts incorporating textile art into fashion and homeware. Claire has also been a key workshop leader for Convenience delivering and supporting projects over the last 3 years.

Homesick for another world with Ellie Hoskins

This free workshop will approach sustainability in writing: how can we avoid writers’ block and reliably create inspiration where there isn’t any? I will be sharing my go-to method of harvesting examples of others’ writing and language that I like and using them as the starting point for my own writing. We will be using a spider diagram/mind map format, using quotes that I’ve found in books and on the internet as prompts to expand upon with our own thoughts. When we have filled the paper and generated enough of our own words, we will form a poem out of them.
 
The prompts provided will be centered around the title ‘homesick for another world’, which is the title of a collection of short stories by Ottessa Moshfegh. Loosely, the prompts will touch upon themes such as climate anxiety, longing, grieving, hoping, and trying, but there will be plenty of freedom to explore alternative themes and ideas alongside these. By the end of the session you will have generated a full a3 page of writing inspiration and a poem. There will be an opportunity at the end of the session to share what you’ve thought about and written with the rest of the group. 

Foraging Walk with Nathan Thomas

This session was an open walk around Birkenhead Park looking out for interesting species to identify and record with the iNaturalist app, while learning about what you can forage from local green spaces and collecting some that can be used in the following workshops. The walk will be accompanied with foraged refreshments. The idea of this workshop is to teach people the basics of foraging and the importance of visiting your local green spaces and protecting the wildlife that lives there.

"My name is Nathan and I work for a conservation charity where I help to restore habitats. I’ve been an avid forager for several years and enjoy going out into my local green spaces to see what I can find to take home and cook into a tasty meal. Foraging is a great way to connect to your local green spaces and nature as it can educate you about the wildlife and gives a great sense of satisfaction when taking something from tree to table. I also enjoy identifying any new species I find while out in nature as this improves my own knowledge and is helpful to record on iNatuarilst."

Herbs for Health (Rosie Ashton)

During this session, Rosie from Urban Herbal introduced springtime herbs and guided participants through tea tasting and how to make a herbal oxymel, plus oxymel tasters and loads of opportunities for questions and discussions about getting started with home herbalism. The oxymel was made using sustainably sourced honey from the Make Hamilton community garden in Birkenhead and all the herbs used during the class have been locally grown or foraged.

Rosie Ashton is a self taught community herbalist who has been working with plants for several years in community gardens across the UK. 

Rosie has a background in permaculture and is an experienced food grower and plant-based chef. She has been creating community gardens and facilitating herbalism, food growing and wellbeing sessions since 2016. 

With a passion for plants, she spends her free time deepening her herbal knowledge foraging, and in her allotment where she grows an ever growing collection of medicinal herbs.

Di Vegemartis

Di is a pastry chef with formal training in classic pastry. 

"When I started, I was horrified by the sheer amount of waste produced on a daily basis, and I gradually developed ways of reducing waste and using ingredients to their full potential. Working in restaurants has broadened my knowledge beyond the pastry section ; in my last position, I was also in charge of fermentation projects. I enjoy foraging, and most of the ingredients I use are either foraged or sourced locally." 

Di's session took place at Birkenhead Park and focussed on showcasing the potential in locally foraging ingredients. Highlighting plants found during Nathan and Rosies sessions, we did a tasting during this. 

Charlotte Boardman

Charlotte lead an introduction to pattern cutting and garment making with an end outcome of each participant finalising a garment by the end of the session. This aims to hand over tools to make, repair and hopefully go fast fashion free. 

I’m Charlotte and I am a maker from Liverpool who works out of her very messy spare bedroom in L8. I decided to go fast fashion free in 2020 and have been sewing, knitting and mending my way to a more sustainable relationship with clothing ever since. 

If you’ve ever wanted a me-made wardrobe I promise you can do it! 

In this workshop you will learn how to customise and cut a pattern and use a sewing machine to make and finish your very own pair of pyjama pants – the first thing I ever successfully made.

This is a workshop for absolute to confident beginners, and the techniques we will be using will be amazing first steps into making garments that will last. 

Lo Tierney

The theme of the workshop was climate activism and will involve making a large, collaborative posters! Lo worked with local charity group OOMOO to deliver this session. 

Lo Tierney is a Liverpool-based artist, illustrator and activist. They graduated from LJMU in 2015 with a BA (Hons) in Graphic Design and Illustration and have been working freelance ever since.

They specialise in activism-based art and portraiture. A few of their clients include; The Walker Art Gallery, Open Culture, Comics Youth, The Whitechapel Centre, Convenience Gallery and Birmingham International Dance Festival."

Lydia O'Hara

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