Cowl Workshops

DATES/TIMES: CLICK ON DATE TO REGISTER WITH PAYPAL

FOR COMPLETE BEGINNERS, really! No previous hand-work experience required.

In this workshop you will learn to create a giant cozy Cowl by recycling old t-shirts into yarn, and ‘knitting’ them on a lap loom into a striking and one-of-a-kind wearable fiber piece. You also get to join in the warm studio atmosphere, with tea and snacks (and wine), and conversation with others in the class as you knit. Many have come in groups of friends and left with more!

Don’t wait to the last minute to register! Classes are cancelled a week before, if registration isn’t met.

ON-DEMAND WORKSHOPS: Don’t see a date you can do? Get five friends together and I will schedule a workshop that works for your schedule on most days. Then I’ll promote to fill the class. Or Schedule a private party and get a big discount.

COST: $35 per person, ONLY 10 SPACES PER CLASS, you must pre-register and an Informational Email will be sent to you approximately 2 days before the class. Classes need 5 people minimum to run. So spread the word to friends! If you want to have your class run, you need to invite friends along! You will be notified 2 days before class if it is canceled, and a refund will be issued.

–Private Parties: Workshops in my studio are available for private parties of up to 10 people for 3 hrs, for $300 Contact me for availability. I can travel most anywhere in Seattle for a $50 travel fee. Outside Seattle is an additional travel fee.

MATERIALS: you will need to bring about 3-5 t-shirts of other garments made of t-shirt knit. Gather them at “the Bins” (read more below), or another thrift-shop or your own closet. They can be in any condition.

AGE/ABILITY: Great for complete beginners! I welcome children with a parent as young as 9. You can work together on one loom, or both register and work on two looms. Children 12 and up are welcome to attend alone.

WHERE: At The Silver Studio in Columbia City, Seattle (my studio)

THREE WORKSHOP DISCOUNT PACKAGE: I’m offering a discount package of any three workshops for $100. Take three workshops yourself, or you and two friends use the package together. It’s any combination you want, and good for a year from purchase. DO NOT register through clicking the date. Purchase HERE and then contact me with the dates you want to apply your three workshops. The workshops you choose will run only with minimum enrollment, just like with individual registrations.

Once you’ve attended, you are eligible for Alumni Open Studio Nights!

GIFT CERTIFICATES: Give studio time as a gift!

WHEN YOU REGISTER:

-Be sure your contact email address with Paypal is correct. That is where I send the “Informational Email” (class confirmation, material list, where to buy them, and the studio address). If you want a different email used, contact me.

– If the class you want fills up, please email me your desired day and I will put you on the waiting list and/or notify when I hold another series of workshops.

– 48 hours before your class, workshop fee is non-refundable, but can be transferred to another person.

Other fiber workshops are available!

I also have Pom-Pom Headdress workshops this season!

MORE ABOUT THE HISTORY OF THE WORKSHOPS

The Cowl Making workshop comes out of a project called “Gleaning, Redeeming, Surviving and Thriving”, where I facilitated for workshop participants the process of taking discarded cheap materials, investing them with one’s time and creating an amazing wearable piece.

We’ll be investigating slow process, re-thinking use, and re-examining self-esteem via self-sufficiency rather than purchasing power.

You’ll be gathering your own materials, engaging with a site of contemporary gleaning: the bins at the Goodwill Outlet.“ The Bins” are an overwhelming striking visual scene of our contemporary way of life of intense consumption, of using goods for a very short time, discarding them before they are worn out, and the massive amount of energy spent on just what to do with this constant flow of fabric.

Our cultural critics today tell us we have moved from being people who can produce to people who only consume. During the course of this project, step back and examine this, examine the art of ‘gleaning’ and slowly making something from the leftovers of our over-buying and over-production. Participants are asked to spend an afternoon at “The Bins” before attending the workshop, picking through the mountains of discarded fabrics, choosing about 5-8 garments made of ‘t-shirt’ knit material.

Using handmade looms that are adaptations of a childhood craft called spool knitting — rake looms from Germany date back to 1535 – I’ll be leading participants through the gleaning process to creating ‘yarn’ to creating a dramatic handmade wearable work, a giant cowl scarf.

This workshop is an homage to the anonymous gleaners and artisans who continually make amazing things from the discards of our throw-away culture.

Despite the transition away from the slow process of harvesting, hand spinning, hand weaving and hand-sewing of cottage industry textile making to the mass produced textiles that so marked the age of the Industrial Revolution, a long-surviving culture of inventive hand-making of usable goods continued, particularly among the textile workers of these massive mechanized factories. To survive, to cloth their own family, warm their own floors, to have pride in their own resourceful creativity, these workers gleaned the wool scraps and selvedge edges, the cigar wrappers, the broken buttons, the extra thread, the used burlap bags, to create remarkable works of art.