Elements is one year old! that anniversary passed by pretty much unnoticed because we have been so busy… here is what we have been up to then in Insta images…
We have just restarted this. To book go to this form! Or email hello@elementsschool.net.
Finally the BEST THING EVER!!! Our Craft Programme!!!
Go to these various pages to book.
This summer we ran a very satisfying Forest School summer scheme and had loads and loads of great feedback. Some of it was so good that it made it to the MyNI website. Here is the link.
Enjoy!
We could not be more thrilled that Matthew is working with us to help bring the vision of accessibility to Arts and Crafts in the outdoors to a wider audience. For only £60 you can create your own beautiful item with young artist Matthew Walton. Fill in this form to reserve your space.
We are all looking forward to the autumn programme. Inspired by our success with Gabriel’s drawing classes and a request to have more, we have put together an all singing all dancing programme which has something for everyone… from metalwork to working with wool to more drawing… and of course weekly forest school we will have something for everyone!
Thank you to Iona Shop in Holywood and Eden Pottery for supporting us. And of course all the wonderful people whom we have worked with… and will be working with in the future. You make everything possible.
So here it goes!!!
Copper Smithing: 25 Sept, 2 October
Learn how to work copper with our new Forest School teacher Matthew Walton. Matthew graduated from the Art College recently and brings his many skills to our party! Copper smithing is only one of them. During this session learn to beat and fold copper. From a copper pipe Matthew will take you through the process of creating your own piece of art or jewelery.
Time: 10 am – 4 pm
Venue: The Quarries
Cost: £60
All material and equipment provided.
Book here
Fungi Drawings with Gabriel Knight
As the autumn gets underway fungi start to read their little heads. These most mysterious members of the botanical world have fascinated us for millennia. The original superfood they have been used by humans to have deeper insight into their lives. Have deeper insight into them with Gabriel. Gabriel’s course was so popular the last time that it was sold out at the end. Make sure you book early! Use this form to book.
| Dates: | 9, 16, 23, 30 October |
| Time: | 10 am – 12 pm |
| Age range: | 12 + |
| Cost: | £20 per person per session or £70 for 4 week black booking in advance |
Fleece to Fabric: The Hidden Magic of Handcrafting Wool
Book here for this course.
Emma has written a short introduction about herself!
Hello, I’m Emma and it is my pleasure and my privilege to welcome you to this course.
Textiles, Costume and Folklore are the passions I carry throughout my professional life and these courses are an incredible opportunity
to share that passion with you. It is my great hope that you will feel and embrace the tactile power of the materials under your fingers and the transformative power of creation in your minds and hearts. I am here to facilitate this for you with over 25 years of experience, expertise and enthusiasm. Above all else, ‘Making’ is a way to connect to yourself and to the world around you. Creativity is a process and a practice which just cannot be overrated.
My experience as a teacher over the years ranges from Kindergarten handwork classes and soft crafts through to extensive felting and fibre
workshops, interiors and dressmaking classes and the pursuit of my own practice as a writer and fibre artist.
The only warning I issue is that working like this is addictive, get ready to be seduced by the integrated worlds of artisan craft and story!
Here is an outline of her course:
Welcome to this creative, productive, hands-on exploration of the culture, history and evolution of wool textiles.
This workshop celebrates wool and its intrinsic connection to oral traditions, cottage industry and industrial processes.
It includes insight into the materials used and a discussion of the folklore and rich traditions of textiles in our part of the world and beyond.
Over the three weeks participants will gain skills in the traditional arts of Fibre Preparation, Wet-felting, Needle-felting, Spinning and Nalbinding.
The course will feed your creative and artistic self while deepening your appreciation of sheep’s wool and all its uses.
You’ll leave with a new insight and passion for working with this incredible material and also your own beautiful, useful pieces of craft and art.
I sincerely look forward to sharing my passion and practical knowledge with you and to enjoying this textile journey together.
Day One. 06/11/21
Handling your wool.
The linguistics of textiles.
A short introduction to needle-felting.
Wet-Felting project to take home.
Day Two. 13/11/21
Processing your wool.
Experience the tactile stages of wool-crafting.
Scouring, carding, combing, hand-spinning, wheel-spinning, and weaving.
Make and learn to use your own hand spindle.
Day Three. 20/11/21
Transforming your wool.
A look at the wide use of wool in human culture.
The properties, composition and function of common and exotic animal fibres.
Create your own tailored choice of nalbinded accessory or fabric.
(Nalbinding is a type of proto-knitting with a single needle)
All natural, high quality, organic and locally sourced materials.
All materials and equipment are provided.
Environmentally conscious. Perfect for gift making.
5 to 8 participants.
4 hours duration.
Important Note.
If you are pregnant or immune-compromised please notify me in advance of booking.
Time: 10 – 2 pm
Cost: £50 per person of £142 for advanced block booking
Our summer scheme – the first ever this year – was sold out. It is hard to believe that Elements is slightly less than a year old.
Children from all over North Down and Belfast got to experience the excitement of the Northern Irish summer.
From the start of July’s scorching heat to the almost deluge at the end of the first week of August, there was always fun to be had.
As nature becomes recognised as more and more important to our well being, being part of Forest School is being seen as something which feeds all elements (excuse the pun) of our bodies and souls.
It is almost a cliche to speak about the sites which we visit as magical but this site really IS magical. The land looked after so thoughtfully by Glencraig is one of the most sensitively managed areas we have used. And yet at the same time so welcoming to people.
It has a river which rises and falls – in a very safe manner. The water is filled with trout and we spent many happy hours trying to catch them.
The children were able to watch first hand the effect of rain on these streams and due to the cleanliness of the water they were able to play in them. It is quite sad that many water courses in Ireland are so polluted due to agricultural run off. But not here!!!!
The forest is large enough for adventures to take place. Like this walk over the troll bridge. Here stories are made and come to life. Here lessons can be learnt without ever being taught. For instance… the troll who lived under this bridge. He lived there because his family didn’t want him to live under the bridges in Belfast because he did not want to eat people. So he now lived there as he caught only fish. So let us be kind to the troll and be good to the water.
Walking in rivers and chasing fish is a lost art – many children today are taught to fear the water and fire. But at Elements, supervised fun is given free reign.
Because we have a small number of children and a group of experienced and passionate teachers, we are able to carry out some very exciting but practical activities. Cooking is very close to children’s hearts and Matthew Walton our new Forest School teacher made gluten free bannock.
We also made potato gratin over the open fire. Apparently this is the best potato dish anyone had ever made!
We whittled little sticks and walking sticks! Knife skills for six to 12 year olds is something we delight in doing. Children working with fire and knives learn that these are tools which are to be respected. If they are careful with them, they will be able to be in control of the fire/ knife and something dangerous can be a help meet.
With the permission of Glencraig, we were able to harvest young sycamore trees as part of the forest management activity and turn these beautiful trees into walking sticks which were keepsakes. We made nettle cords and these were then used to create handles on the walking sticks which hands could be slipped through.
We also spent time at the beach and made rocket stoves learning how to make a small efficient fire using only a tin and cottonwool. Every day was a learning day, every minute a minute of fun and just like that it was over.
Tired but happy has to be our tagline… that and of course, the Greatest Outdoors!!!!
Hi all, I thought I’d try and update the very busy last year we have had. It has been an incredible journey we have taken since the end of September last year.
Before we get into that here is the booking form in case you’d like to find out more about what we are doing…
Because we now have art classes, weekly sessions, a summer scheme and birthday parties, we have a single booking form for you to register your interest. Fill it in and Jonathan will get back to you… or you CAN email hello@elementsschool.net. Or call 07410411840.
Some highlights:
Quarries Sessions
Our Quarries sessions were the first to get going. Thanks to Joan Woods, we were able to start our Tuesday and Saturday sessions. We had originally hoped to have had a peripatetic existence, taking the Elements experience on the road to schools, but Covid prevented this. So instead, we began our sessions here in this impossibly idyllic site. We counted frogs, listened to stories and made fires…. we watched the seasons change here.
Hillsbrough Sessions
We began sessions in Hillsbrough in October and we had a little band of Elements. It has been very successful and we will continue with this.
Sassy Susan has been named by the students who attend Hillsbrough. She was an important part of our map making and orienteering sessions. Some skills we covered during these sessions included
Óiche Shamhna
Collaborating with artist Jennifer McQuillan we put on a Halloween which returned to the Sidhe and traditions which venerated this very special evening as the start of the Celtic year. There was even a full moon!!!!
Green Santa!
To get away from the commercialism of Christmas, we invited the Green Santa to come along and put up in the roundhouse at The Quarries. The beautiful cold evenings with a welcoming fire and candlelit room made it an encounter to remember.
Birthday Parties!
We were delighted to be able to host birthday parties where we played games, had a space to cut the cake and spend sometime in nature!
Art classes… beginning of lessons for older children and adults
For the longest time we were asked if we would organise sessions for older people and children and Gabriel Knight obliged! We started drawing classes for 12+ that included charcoal making and making elderflower cordial. As the first set of classes comes to an end, we are now organsing the Autumn programme. We are looking at copper smelting, survival skills, textile work, more drawing (of fungi) and an acrylic painting workshop – just in time for Christmas gifts. Of course Halloween and Green Santa will be there right along with us!
I have a silly little dream that it will eventually evolve into the equivalent of a 21st century hub of the Arts and Crafts movement… With artists from far and wide coming to work with us and with people from different age groups and abilities.
We can always dream…
Our first summer scheme
The summer scheme is about to start and we are holding it in Helen’s Bay. For the very first time and it is completely sold out! Here’s hoping for a truly wonderful two weeks.
Whew!
All that’s left is for us to say thank you. We would like to name check the following people and organisations
Alison McCaw and the Ards and North Down Social Enterprise Programme
They helped us do our business plan, helped us get in touch with so many kind people and Alison gave us such sound advise and supported us unreservedly. It was impossible to have a better mentor
Joan Woods and the Quarries Farm
Joan invited us to set up at the Quarries and gave us a start! Thank you Joan!
Heidi Steffen, Iona Shop
Heidi has supported us with the donation of some art supplies
Brian Poots, NIFSA
Brian trained me (Stephanie) and gave me so much encouragement to start. We also helped speak to some people to get started in Lisburn.
And thank you to everyone who has come along for our programmes and supported us that way. We hope that you have gotten as much out of them as we have had putting them on.
We made a summer mandala today – creating a ring using our body as a compass and then laying out flowers around the periphery. We then made a pyramid in the middle and decorated it with ferns and more flowers. In this way we learned that a pyramid has four sides – but has triangle as a side. Scared geometry is everywhere – the circle (eternity), the square (Earth) and the triangle (Trimurti).
Working with pruning saws – our participants are given real tools to work with – which can be shocking I guess for some… but from the age of 6 they are taught to respect and use these tools. Here the child saws a stick to create a whole arsenal – today we made a pick axe and a spear.
The Iona Shop in Holywood which stocks all manner of good things is sponsoring some of our art materials for the sessions with Gabriel. The shop stocks only the very best quality colour pencils, crayons, pastels and carries a wide range of papers for crafting. There is also a very small mark up on these materials as Heidi is committed to making the best art materials available to all – although they are by no means cheap, these crayons are made from beeswax and the colour pencils are vibrant and true.
If you love art you will love the art collection at the Iona Shop.
We have had some spectacular weather and enjoyed some memorable afternoons in Hillsbrough and the Quarries.
Here are some highlights. But before we go any further a big shout out to Laura Laffin to thank her for stepping on over the past two Tuesday with us!
Also our little band of Elementals at Hillsbrough grows!
We have also experienced a really high demand for the Summer Scheme. Can’t wait to get it going!
This week we practised our whittling skills by whittling little spears. Or litter pickers. Jonathan gave an impromptu Physics lesson and I told the Australian Aboriginal story The Flower Seekers.
Here we are checking out a fungi on a log.
Because we now have art classes, weekly sessions, a summer scheme and birthday parties, we have a single booking form for you to register your interest. Fill it in and Jonathan will get back to you… or you CAN email hello@elementsschool.net. Or call 07140411840.
This week our regulars at the Quarries were given the lesson of the cycle of life when we found a dead buzzard which had become entangled in the brambles. We were able to talk about how everything returns to the Earth and how we all are part of the same cycle in a gentle way. After that we buried the bird – we gave it a star burial – where it lay beneath the skies.
We used some of its feathers to decorate our walking sticks. Only a few feathers were taken, as you can see from the photograph.
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