The Seaside Sisters return to Craft Central in Clerkenwell for their annual showcase of coastal inspired textiles and prints.

The “queens of coastal craft” have laid all hands on deck to bring you their 2012 collection of seaside themed homewares and accessories.  Inspired by holidays spent collecting seashells, mermaid lore and souvenirs, their work celebrates the charm of our British seaside towns on all points of the compass, North, South, East and West. You can see pictures from last year’s show on our Facebook album here.

Create your own souvenirs with the Seaside Sisters exciting programme of print and textile workshops running during showcase in the evenings and weekends.  Try out print gocco, embroidery or lino printing to create hankies, notebooks and tea towels inspired by the Seaside Sisters collection of vintage souvenirs.  Children can take part in the signal flag treasure hunt around the show. Details of workshops and bookings are below.

See a film of the Seaside Sisters getting crafty on the LV21 ship last summer -

Craft Central

33-35 St John’s Square

London EC1M 4DS

Tuesday to Saturday, 11am to 6.30pm.

Afternoon tea party Saturday 30^th June at 2pm.

Free entrance.

Nearest tube Farringdon.  Or a short walk / bus from Old Street or Angel.

Bus routes 63, 55, 243 and 153.

Craft Central print and textile workshops

Print gocco with Xtina Lamb

Wednesday 27^th June, 6.30pm – 9pm

£40 includes all materials and refreshments. Book a place

Embroider souvenir hankies with Gillian Elam of Fabric Nation

Embroider a souvenir handkerchief with Gillian from Fabric Nation. We provide all the materials, including pure cotton hankies, embroidery silks and for inspiration, our collection of vintage souvenir hankies and textile design books. You will be handle vintage souvenirs from the 30s to 60s and learn about souvenir hankie designs and embroidery at this workshop.

With our tuition and top tips you will design and stitch your own hankie all handmade by you.

Thursday 28th June 6.30pm – 9pm

£25 includes all materials and refreshments

All workshops are suitable for beginners.

Book your workshop place here.

Print a tea towel with Gillian Elam of Fabric Nation

Print Your Own Tea Towel with Gillian from Fabric Nation. We provide all the materials, including pure cotton tea towels, fabric inks and for inspiration, our collection of vintage tea towels and textile design books.

With our tuition and top tips you will design and cut your own lino block and print up a tea towel, all handmade by you. We use a soft lino which is much easier to cut than the traditional lino you might remember from your school days. All inks are washable and non-toxic, but do bring a pinny in case of inky stains. The inks are fixed by ironing, so your finished tea towel can be used and washed. That’s if you don’t plan to frame your work of art!

Take a peek at our Facebook album to see all the fab things we made at our previous printing workshops.

Saturday 30^th June 11am – 2pm

£25 includes all materials and refreshments

All workshops are suitable for beginners and children from age 8 are welcome accompanied by an adult.

Book your workshop place here.

We are gathering up red, white and blue fabrics galore for our Diamond Jubilee Souvenir workshops, part of the all day Jubilee festival in Battersea Park, curated by Hemingway Design and Clare Patey, on Sunday 3rd June.

Join us by the boating lake to screen print a parade flag to wave & keep as a souvenir, or sew a ruffle rosette to wear.  You can draw on paper bunting inspired by favourite memories from the jubilee celebrations or from the past 60 years to be added to string for a display that grows over the day or make diamond charms to carry or wear.  You can even go Victorian style and decorate a bicycle wheel or hoop with patriotic colours. Create giant floral signs and garlands decorated with flowers made from plastic bag strips in the style of those used in Queen Victorias Jubilee.

Tickets for the festival are available here - http://www.thamesdiamondjubileepageant.org/TicketsAndInfo.aspx

You can get your fingers inky too if you want to join in. Book an evening workshop for the chance to make prints from your own artwork with Print Gocco screen printing machines. Or visit during the daytime and you’ll be invited take part in the printing in progress, or just enjoy taking a peek at how Xtina’s colourful products are made.

Printed Wonders Open Studio
The Showcase Craft Central, 33-35 St. John’s Square, London EC1M 4DS – Map
1st – 4th May 2012
11am – 5.30pm Tue – Fri, Free entry
Gocco workshops, Wed 2nd & Thu 3rd May, 6.30pm – 9.30pm, £40

Just for the Crafty Fox Spring Market, we are expanding our seaside selection of homewares and accessories, to bring you the easter fox.  We will be showing you how to make these foxy egg cosies to guard your eggs over easter at our special Crafty Fox workshop all day Saturday 24th March at the Crafty Fox Market in the Dogstar, Brixton.  Watch out little chicks…

Our first outing this year will be at the marvellous Crafty Fox Spring Market.  We can’t wait. We had lots of fun there last year and  are looking forward to sharing our latest souvenir finds, textile accessories, prints and all things bright and coastal…We will be running an Easter Fox workshop as well, so pop down for some Spring fun.

Linda is enjoying a brief quiet moment before the doors opened – have a peek here for more photos…

Here’s the lowdown…

Spring Market

Saturday 24th & Sunday 25th March 2012, 11am – 5pm, The Dogstar – Brixton. 

Earlier this year Lucy bought some bunting with lucky motifs and promptly emigrated with it. She sent this great photo with the message “Just to say thank you for getting the gorgeous bunting to me in time before we flew. We moved into our Chicago apartment with nothing but an inflatable bed, a duvet and your bunting, it was the perfect instant decoration and has indeed brought us much luck.“

Greg got in touch in September with the delightful idea of commissioning custom alphabet bunting to help him propose to his girlfriend Cathy. He chose the style that threads onto tape with a hem, so that he could assemble the letters himself and build a sense of anticipation! Plus the bonus of being able to rearrange them into amusing anagrams afterwards. Thankfully Cathy is now his fiancé, and Greg sent this photo with the news “Just to let you know that I finally asked and she said “yes”! Your bunting worked a treat. Everyone was very impressed!“. Phew! What a great idea, who could resist a proposal written in bunting, and someone sweet enough to think of it?

There will be examples of Gocco work, tips for getting the best results and ideas such as how to re-use damaged screens. You can also try out the squeegee printing method. Shepherds will be supplying fine papers to print on. You’ll take home your screen and prints.
Book via Shepherds 020 7831 1151 or matt@bookbinding.co.uk
£60, max 5 places.

Part two takes place at Xtina’s studio at Craft Central in Clerkenwell on Sunday 4th December, and promises a day of Gocco screen printing and experimentation. Make screens from your own artwork using the Gocco machine and Riso mesh. Stretch the mesh on a thin plastic frame, then print with a lightweight squeegee and water based screen printing ink.

Try out a thermofax machine to make a screen without using Gocco bulbs, and print with texture screens and hand cut stencils onto cards, paper, notebooks and fabric. Registration techniques and lots of tips will be shared. The screens you make are yours to take home. You can carry on printing with them later with supplies easily bought from art shops, and it’s ideal timing for making Xmas cards or gifts!

Sandwiches, tea and cake are included in the price.
£60, max 6 places


Full details & online booking via Etsy

We have only had a few glimpses so far, but are very pleased with what we have seen so far.  Over 60 step-by-step projects are included along with some inspiring interviews with craftsters and a handy how-to section which covers the basics of knitting, crochet and sewing.   The book  has been edited by Victoria Woodcock, who’s knowledge of the craft scene from her experience as the London Bust Craftacular curator really shows through.  As well as our crafty project, the book also features Gillian’s 1970s school bazaar inspired brooches.

There are some fab designers featured in the book and it is lovely to see so many of the familiar faces we have met at different craft events.  There are even some nice reviews out already, including this one by BrandNewKindOf.

The Seaside Sisters Get Crafty Onboard LV21 from Spaghetti Weston on Vimeo.

We had a lovely last day on Light Vessel 21 with Print Gocco workshops, more brooch making and treasure hunts and lots of sunshine on deck.  We also enjoyed the company of Bob making knots to create a fender for the ship’s little boat and the wonderful Colin and his morse code machines.  During the afternoon we were treated to the gentle rhythm of morse code messages being exchanged all over the world.  After a wonderful week we wave goodbye to LV21.