Tag: ashbourne

Stitching Ashbourne: Workshop Dates Announced!

everystitchastory

I’m super excited to announce that 17 Stitching Ashbourne workshops will be taking place over the next two months at venues all across town!

From cafés to tap rooms, community spaces to church halls, Ashbourne is opening its doors, and its heart, to this creative new project. A huge thank you to House of Beer, Sticky Fingers, Cornerstone Café, Ashbourne Methodist Church’s Craft & Chat Group, and Ashbourne Town Hall for so generously hosting and supporting us.

We’ve been blown away by the enthusiasm from businesses and groups across Ashbourne. Offers of workshop space, funding, and practical help have shown us just how much this town loves to come together.

How You Can Get Involved

There are still plenty of ways to join in and help shape this vibrant community artwork:

Shape the design
What places in Ashbourne matter most to you? Which buildings should be celebrated in our textile artwork? Share your thoughts in our short survey here: Take the survey →

Attend a workshop
Drop in to one of our free, friendly sessions and try your hand at creating an embroidered appliqué square. No sewing experience needed, just bring your ideas and creativity. Workshop details here

Support the project financially
Thanks to a generous seed grant of £564 from Ashbourne Methodist Church, we’ve made a great start, but we’re now seeking additional funding to complete the project. If you’re a local business, funder, or individual who’d like to get involved, we’d love to collaborate. You can also support us directly via our crowdfunding page →.

Donate refreshments
Help us keep the tea and creativity flowing! We’re looking for supplies of tea, coffee, biscuits, long-life milk, sugar, and paper cups for our workshops.

Donate fabric
Got fabric scraps in terracotta, stone, rust, blues, or sage greens? Every piece, big or small, will find its place in our textile story.

To donate refreshments, fabric, or to discuss funding support, please contact Laura at laura_Burrill@outlook.com.

This is more than just a project, it’s a celebration of Ashbourne’s people, places, and spirit. Whether you stitch, support, or simply share your stories, we’d love you to be part of it. Together, we’ll stitch Ashbourne’s story into something truly special.

Narrative threads of a bigger story…

everystitchastory

The Holocaust Memorial Day: 80 Candles Quilt Project is well under way; gently gathering people and stories, building learning, understanding and connections. No two workshops have been the same, some vibrant spaces of research and tradition sharing, others more gentle quiet spaces of reflection and creativity.

Participants at the Cornerstone Cafe, Ashbourne in a workshop sponsored by Ashbourne Methodists Craft & Chat Group.

21 participants have taken part so far in the 3 workshops and 21 more are signed up to workshops over the coming weeks. We also have 7 postal packs out in the wild. Contributions have begun to be delivered, it’s so exciting to see what participants have created and fascinating to get an insight into their research.

For Susanne Lang by Naomi Feldman
For Sonja Jaslowitz by Laura Burrill

There is a clear sense from participants that this project is broadening understanding and knowledge. By stitching together, we are all benefiting from each other’s research. Our small contributions are narrative threads in a much bigger story. “I never leaned any of this in school” has been a common workshop comment. With participants of all ages, social and religious backgrounds taking part, it is really starting to feel like an important piece of work with agency to keep the conversation going well after its completion.

Mother and daughter stitching at the Cornerstone Cafe Workshop, Ashbourne. Irene is a GCSE Textiles Student and Beth is a member of the Ashbourne Creative Stitchers group.