National Festival Of Making

We had a great weekend at the National Festival of Making in Blackburn. Co-founded by Wayne Hemingway, the festival celebrates a new kind of making and brings together makers and manufacturers in a two day event that takes over Blackburn town centre. It’s truly inspirational and demonstrates the immense interest and passion for making.

At Diamond Awl Leather Workshop we invited people to try out some traditional leatherwork skills, in our 1 hour taster workshops. Everyone went away with their very own hand stitched accessory and we hope we inspired those who came to start on their own leatherwork journey.

One of our favourite moments was when a ten year old, whilst hand stitching turned round to me and said ‘I’m REALLY enjoying this, with the happiest look on her face. Worth it’s weight in gold.

It’s the second time we’ve taken part in The National Festival of Making and we’re already looking forward to next year.  Again we were overwhelmed by the general buzz and the pride that people have in Blackburn. It’s a real testament to the importance of make and manufacture.

We were also pretty chuffed to make it onto the news – take a look here

 

If you would like to learn traditional leather take a look at out one day and two day courses.