Transition Town Tooting

Tag: CARAS

  • Sewing and Sanctuary – spring update 2025

    Sewing and Sanctuary – spring update 2025

    The group is really flourishing with about a dozen of us meeting above Oxfam every Friday morning.
    Alongside variously themed sessions, for a few months we have been working on a commission from
    Wandsworth Carers to make a banner for their new Iris Cafe, a group for people with dementia and their
    carers which meets monthly in the community hall of St Luke’s church, Ramsden Road. The completed
    banner was delivered to the group on 21st January and they were delighted with it. They particularly wanted the banner to be made from re-used materials and our group was well placed to deliver this. The strong backing fabric was sourced from the Work and Play Scrapstore and all other materials used were rescued from the recycling bags at Oxfam. Jeni visited the Iris Cafe in October to find out about the interests and memories of the attendees and she fed these back into the sewing group. This inspired the appliqué motifs made by individual members of our group, for example the tomatoes which one man used to grow in Jamaica, an artist’s palette and brush, for a man who was an artist, a cricket bat and ball and to represent music, vinyl records made from crochet! Nicola then visited the Iris Cafe in November to run an activity session making pom-poms and felt flowers. This was very positive as it encouraged the attendees to talk about their hobbies and interests. These items were brought back to Oxfam and added to the banner. Various skills were learnt by the group during the making of the banner such as using machine embroidery and how to appliqué. It was a truly collaborative project.

    Late last year we held a celebration ‘bring and share’ lunch. During the session we used the ‘five ways
    to well-being’ principles to review our first 6 months as a group (Connect, Keep Learning, Take Notice, Be
    Active, Give). We made gifts and decorations from our lucky dip of pre-prepared craft kits. Members of the group brought in things they had sewn and we put lots of our work on display around the room. We were joined by Nelly Buscardini from Oxfam and Mary Hargreaves from Wandsworth Welcomes Refugees, and have since heard that our group has helped Oxfam become Wandsworth’s first ‘Shop of Sanctuary’.

    The group also discussed what they would like to do in future sessions. Suggestions included learning about pattern cutting and clothes making. We also plan to do some visible repair sessions and upcycling of clothes. Other ideas are embellishing prints with embroidery and making cushions and tote bags.

    The group is very mixed with a small number from our connection with CARAS, some of whom
    have introduced friends of theirs. Some women have been referred via Wandsworth Welcomes Refugees and others through connection with an art group held at Ascension church, Balham. Other members of the group are local women, many of whom got to know us through the Tooting Tapestry project. It is wonderful to see women learning together, sharing skills and helping one another. Women find companionship, a calm environment, creativity and a sense of achievement.

  • ACE 2019 – A celebration of Transition in Tooting and looking forward…

    On Saturday 2nd March, we held our Annual Celebratory Extravaganza! at Mushkil Aasaan on Tooting High Street. 75 people came from diverse backgrounds, some close to Transition Town Tooting, some coming for the first time, some young, some not so young, all very welcome!
    75 people joined us to celebrate! And look forward together

    It was fun looking back at our activity and seeing how we have worked.

    7 themes of our endeavours emerged:

    Local Food Growing and Cooking

    Outdoor Learning

    Urban Nature and Biodiversity

    Good Change Locally

    Creativity and Imagination

    Low Carbon Living

    Wellbeing and Community Inclusion

    Do you Jellybrella?

    Mushkil Aasaan was decorated in true TTT style with a  displays highlighting specific projects and partners: folks sitting on the Talk / Not Talk bench made by CARAS and TTT; the Community Garden and a partnership project with Gatton School; the Foodival annual community food festival; the buzzing presence of crocheted honeybees illustrated the community & CARAS getting together. We shared the extraordinary Jellybrella – happening now and during the Wandsworth Arts Fringe.

     Looking back

    We celebrated over 20 projects ranging across local food, urban outdoors, outdoor learning, creativity and imagination, wellbeing and community inclusion, good change locally, low carbon living and how all that sits within wider networks. 17 people spoke of these projects, painting a vivid picture of what Transition Town Tooting does, and does in partnership with such a rich array of organisations, just some examples of project partners are the London Beekeepers’ Association, Ravenstone Primary School, CARAS, Wandsworth Oasis, Work and Play Scrapstore, J4Y Scouts and  Furzedown Low Carbon Zone.

    This idea of network and collaboration has grown deeper in recent years and gives context to our work locally as part of a wider movement for change, touched on at the Annual Celebration when Lucy gave us the background on Extinction Rebellion, a growing number of Councils declaring a climate emergency and school children striking for climate. Coupled with that are events such as the CTRLshift Emergency Summit for Change, happening 8th to 10th of May in Stoke, that looks to provide a platform for connection and collaboration across all actors working towards a more sustainable and regenerative future.

    After listening for AGES, we looked forward together…

    Looking forward…

    Richard, Sharon and Chuck,
    TTT’s Acting Secretary
    and Co-Chairs
    The business of the AGM took place, with Richard Couldrey being sworn in as TTT Acting Secretary and Sharon Gray and Chuck Whitehead as Acting Co-Chairs. David Thorne volunteered to continue as TTT’s Treasurer. 
    Why “Acting”, well, we’re changing the way we do things and moving from the Co-Chair model of governance to a “Governance Circle”, including more people, sharing the workload and, hopefully, making it more accessible for YOU to join in!

    How we design together…

    Chuck led us through a simple and fun activity to look forward, as a group, involving pairing up with someone you didn’t know very well and answering 2 questions: What could Transition Town Tooting do in 2019? + What could Foodival look like in 2019?

    Feedback from ACE diverse participants about activities in 2019.

    Even as raw feedback, it’s very interesting and valuable what dozens of people care about and wanted to say at short notice – the activity only lasted 15 minutes or so. It was noticeable that ‘social sustainability’ is very strongly represented. It was also noticeable that the responders were culturally diverse: reflecting Tooting. Read the ideas here.

    Time to enjoy some cake before pack away and look forward to great projects together in 2019…

    Many thanks to Sharon, Chuck, Richard, Eleanor and Hilary for photos!
    The “Talk, not talk” bench makes its way home…
    Turning heads as it goes! 

  • Jellybrella: TTT’s creative project for spring 2019

    In Spring 2019 TTT is inviting everyone to join in with Jellybrella, our free and participatory community arts sustainabity project reusing waste to celebrate creativity, diversity, welcoming, wellbeing and making alongside others.  
    We’ll be popping up in February, March, April & May. All invited!

    It’s early days to be sharing this, but we’ve started to share info on Jellybrella so it’s an opportunity to tell the full story on the blog. Yesterday we created an Instagram account – have a look.
    Thanks loads to David Pitt for donating time to create our logo!
    We’re proud that the May 11th event will be part of the Wandsworth Arts Fringe. It will be a free family creative workshop for adults & children where we’ll use scrap materials to create exciting sculptures. 
    Specifically we’ll be transforming the lost and found umbrellas of Tooting, getting together to enjoy some community making –  we’ll all become artists making our community beautiful with stories & hands-on making together.
    Why umbrellas? We’ve realised they are everywhere – in pubs, stations, public spaces; left behind, lost, broken…or maybe usable.
     
    Umbrellas represent shelter, put you into your own little umbrella-world and we use them to express ourselves, to look and feel good. They are so diverse…and that’s before we have decorated them.
    Why Jellybrella? Think umbrellas transformed into jellyfish: we’ll re-use waste materials to make giant sea creatures, sea flowers & jellyfish.
    Before the public event on May 11th we’re also doing a series of workshops with diverse local adult groups. Those will be differently-facilitated from the family day – an adult group’s response to creating with umbrellas will be different if, for example, they are visually impaired or a dementia group. Please get in contact here to chat if you are part of an adult group that may be interested to host a workshop.
    Whatever the setting, in the workshops neglected umbrellas will come alive with their trailing tentacles of many colours. Or make your Jellybrella into a message or poem with a cascade of words.  As proud makers we’ll parade them – the test ones we’ve made are great in motion. If it rains on our parade…we’ll have our Jellybrellas!
    There will also be a storyteller who will move us with tales of lost & found umbrellas & living with less waste, helping us all be artists taking care of the health and wellbeing of our neighbours, community and city.
    All materials will be provided – if you like please bring your own favourite or neglected umbrella (surprise us!) to transform into a Jellybrella.
    The venue in May will be Sprout Community Arts in Furzedown and we have 3 other key partners. Young people from CARAS are aiming to co-facilitate and we’re looking forward to fabulous materials from the Work & Play Scrapstore and from Wandsworth Oasis – thanks for all this community support!
    We are also very grateful for the support of the award of a Wandsworth Arts Fringe Grant. That’s great to make the project happen and to put it on the map, and having the funds enables local artists to maintain their own livelihoods. 
    “People don’t know that we need Jellybrella but afterwards we’ll wonder how we lived without!”

  • What’s happening with the knitted bees of Tooting? – Update #2 on our partnership project with CARAS

    We’ve enjoyed and learned so much from our partnership project with CARAS which has been running since spring 2015.
    Here’s Update #2 on one more of the project strands – this one involving the CARAS Women’s Group for refugees and asylum-seekers. We shared Update #1 a fortnight ago – read it here.

    The knitted honeybees of Tooting
    It’s not often you can ask “what’s happening in the world of Tooting’s knitted & crocheted bees?” We’ve been busy since spring 2018 on a fascinating quest that started with our beekeeper friend Richard who is Chair of the London Beekepers Association asking “Do you know anyone who could make some model bees as teaching aids? Toy bees available online are all hopelessly inaccurate…we need about 50…”
    I immediately said “yes!” and a new project was born…which has developed to include the CARAS Family Day and Women’s Group, a wonderful local group of knitters, beekepers and TTT.

    It’s been so moving to us all that this novel partnership has come together: local craftspeople with experience and skill plus refugee women with skills and desire to create plus our own TTT colleagues. We’ve got together for the interest and challenge, in order to work with a London-wide group’s own fascinating project in an imaginative way.

    Attaching wings and legs at the CARAS Women’s Group

    Richard and the LBKA are developing participative classes for schools. The bee models would need to have the correct number of legs (6), eyes (5) and wings (4), with antennae (2) in just the right place on their heads (“not like antlers and not like whiskers”), triangular downward-facing heads, a waist: all giving the general look of a honeybee with correct details while also being imaginative prompts for LBKA workshops. The bees should definitely not have cartoon smiles.


    We chatted: Jane suggested crochet or knitting rather than sewing; Nicola knew just the right people – a group of Knitters and Natterers including Margaret, Dora, Joan and Mandie who regularly make dozens of stuffed textile toys for local charities. Co-ordinated by Margaret, we settled on finger puppet bees and over 50 bee bodies were knitted and crocheted. Margaret created patterns and templates for the bee parts – a first for her (maybe a first in London?).

    Dora
    Joan

    Samples were made and adjusted and tried out in LBKA pilot school workshops where children took on the diverse roles of honeybees: exploring, doing the waggle-dance, foraging & more.
    Richard visited a CARAS Family Day session in the Tooting Community Garden where many of the Women’s Group participants were present with their families. He took along an observation bee hive, local honey to sample and talked about individuals’ own experience of bees.

    Mandie
    Margaret & Nicola

    The final phase of making took place this month in the CARAS Women’s Group where Margaret facilitated 50+ bee puppets having their wings and legs cut out of gauze or felt and sewn on by the refugee and asylum-seekers at the group. One woman said that she was pleased to be ‘helping educate about bees and honey’. Many of the women would like to do more knitting and crochet. (And so could the CARAS Youth Club. Our session a year ago making macrame plant pot holders was very popular with young men and women both).

    At one level when we have been occupied in the project we take it for granted – this is how we do things, how TTT  promotes community participation, creativity, fun and problem-solving. 
    Then, perhaps when we’re explaining this to someone new, we realise “Wow! This is an amazing experience…all this sharing for the love of it, sustained over 10 months. That’s a world I like to be part of!”

    Plus we know we are all contributing to people of all ages learning about honeybees, pollination and the value of protecting habitats and growing bee-forage plants in the city. LBKA’s tagline is ‘What’s good for bees is good for people’.

    Thinking about bee puppet materials: most materials used have been ‘in stock’ in the makers’ sewing boxes and cupboards. Margaret produced mosquito netting for bees’ wings that she had saved since working in Africa 40 years ago. Ditto her vintage Shamrock brand Irish linen carpet thread. We found wool and more at the Work & Play Scrapstore.

    Jeni

    Nothing new has been purchased. The bee puppets have been created out of the love of making and sharing.
    If you are inspired to take part the CARAS + TTT projects – perhaps offering good ideas or simply your time, sharing specialist skills, as a donor in kind, as a partner group – you are very welcome to contact Chuck at TTT by email here.
    Over 40 individuals and 15 local organisations locally have contributed to the partnership in many ways over the past 4 years.
    Thanks to everyone involved so far! – Chuck

  • Eco-checking, a memorial bench, school planters, knitted bees and Jellybrella – 2019 Update #1 on our partnership project with CARAS

    We’ve enjoyed and learned so much from our partnership project with CARAS which has been running since spring 2015.
    Here’s a short update on several of the strands – taking the first three in the list above, each of which has involved the Youth Club for asylum-seekers and refugees. We’ll share Update #2 soon.

    As ever, if you are inspired to contribute to the projects – offering good ideas or simply your time, sharing specialist skills, as a donor in kind, as a partner group – you are very welcome to contact Chuck at TTT by email here.
    Over 40 individuals and a dozen local organisations locally have been involved with the TTT + CARAS partnership in many ways over the past 4 years.

    Eco-Checking the CARAS offices
    CARAS has achieved a gold standard London Youth Quality Mark for carrying out participatory and youth-led eco-check of activities across 3 sets of sustainability criteria: Energy & Water; Healthy Living and Litter & Waste. Helped by Egle from CARAS and Sara from TTT, a team of young people identified relevant issues and then analysed how well the organisation as a whole deals with the challenges.

    The intention was not to blame, but to make an action plan for ‘things to change and put right’ as well as ‘things we do well already…and so we should keep doing them!’

    Examples from the action plan:

    • stop purchasing single use plastics for the many meals that are prepared as part of the CARAS programmes
    • renew the planting boxes outside the offices for 2019 so that we’re growing what we might like to eat, and so that there are beautiful plants that are welcoming, that we like and that are good for pollinating insects

    Here are the brand new colourful plates, bowls and cutlery which will be used again and again at CARAS and on Family Days at other local venues.
    You’re welcome to read the eco-check detail – click here.
    It’s admirable because it is short, practical and understandable, and transferable to many other community voluntary settings.

    Congratulations to the multi-language group who came together in Tooting to put the eco-check together!


    Benches and Planters
    Since last summer we’ve been designing and making a bench for The Spires, a local charity working with homeless people. The bench is a memorial to past users of The Spires who have died.

    That’s an example of this whole past year’s priority with CARAS young people: to engage them directly with community groups with needs that the youth club can respond to with energy, skills and creativity.
    It’s been a fascinating design and build experience. Later we’ll share a summary of the project from model making onwards, showing how many hands have been able to contribute.

    The final stage is to add the names of the people for whom the bench is a memorial, and this is being done using laser-cut adhesive copper tape.
    TTT’s bench project co-ordinator Dermot says:
    “It’s moving and humbling to see the young people taking such care with typefaces and the fiddly details necessary in order to a high-impact bench which celebrates people they have never met. Seeing the bench all the way through to completion over months of work is a big achievement”.

    The next project that we’ll do with the Youth Club is another example of a local group ‘reaching in’ to engage with CARAS young people alongside their own team. Chestnut Grove Academy want to create set of planters located right at their newly-created entrance – perhaps to grow ingredients for Food Tech, perhaps to make a quiet space for the Library which looks out on the site, certainly to create a beautiful space. The school wants to commission these planters in an original and creative way.

    The entrance to Chestnut Grove, with the site on the left.

    We’ll be facilitating CARAS young people to work on site with the school community including parents and students. This is a new challenge – for for the first time in 4 years of our build projects we won’t be doing mobile carpentry on the steps of the Hall at Derinton Road!

    In our next update we’ll share news on knitted bees and Jellybrella. We look forward to teasing your interest and sharing details. – Chuck

  • Join us at the London National Park City Fair on 21st July to co-create a Greener, Healthier and Wilder London!

    We’re thrilled to be invited to contribute to the London National Park City Fair on Saturday July 21st 11:00 – 5:00 – all the details here.

    The purpose of the Fair is to celebrate’s London’s potential to be Greener, Healthier and Wilder.
    Two dozen stands & an A-Z of short talks will show how that potential can be an imagined & achieved right now.

    Our stand focuses on our partnership projects and facilitation since 2015 with CARAS the Tooting charity who work with refugees and asylum-seekers: all about social sustainability in the community.

    We’ll be sharing our thoughtful, creative and fun Signs of Welcome making workshop – come and join in: any ages, any languages welcome and you can take your signs home to brighten up your neighbourhood.

    We’ll share 5 short case studies that explore our work in partnership with CARAS beneficiaries, and explore options with stand visitors who are interested to get involved as volunteers.
    You can read the case studies here.

    There’s also a more formal description of the history and impact of the partnership since 2015 – read it here.

    Finally on sharing learning, there’s an article on our Stay With Love pallet-benches on the London National Park City website in the Making a Difference section here.

    We’ll have a prize draw to attract a lucky winner plus family or friends to Tooting for a Taste of Tooting experience! You’ll enjoy our diverse food culture, try recipes from CARAS participants and cook on an open fire on the Tooting Community Garden. Here’s a copy of the prize draw details: you have to come along to the Fair to enter!

    Please join in the fun of the Fair and meet us at the stand – we look forward to seeing you and we’re proud to be contributing alongside so many fascinating London groups.

  • ‘Even When I Fall’ film showing to celebrate Refugee Week 2018 in Tooting

    Join us to celebrate Refugee Week 2018 in Tooting!
    It’s the 20th annual Refugee Week, and in TTT’s 10th anniversary year we’re proud to be showing ‘Even When I Fall’ in partnership with CARAS and St. Mary Magdalene Church, Wandsworth Common.
     
     
    When: Sunday 17th June. Doors open 7:00 for tea and a samosa and the film starts at 7:30
    Where: St Mary Magdalene Church, in the Main Hall. 202 Trinity Road SW17 7HP – near Wandsworth Common
    Free showing: we’ll ask for voluntary donations to cover costs
    Queries: please contact us by email
    ‘Even When I Fall’ is an intimate, beautiful film that harnesses the visual power of circus to give a unique perspective into the complex world of human trafficking.
    ‘Even When I Fall’ traces the journey of Sheetal and Saraswoti, two girls from Nepal. 
     
    They met as teenagers in a Kathmandu refuge, survivors of child trafficking to corrupt Indian circuses and brought back to a country they could barely remember.
     
    Inadvertently these girls were left with a secret weapon by their captors – their breath-taking skills as circus artists. 
    With 11 other young trafficking survivors, the girls form Circus Kathmandu – Nepal’s first and only circus.
    The group continues to take circus skills and trafficking awareness workshops all over Nepal.

  • The simple invitations of our ‘Signs of Welcome’ workshops have brought vivid, compelling and complex results. More to come, please join in!

    It’s TTT’s tenth anniversary, and we’re facilitating ten free, fun, thoughtful and creative ‘Signs of Welcome’ workshops locally, along with our partner CARAS. We’re in diverse venues that are themselves welcoming and interesting spaces to visit: cafes, shops, local enterprises.
    We’re half way through – five workshops completed since March and five more in the next few weeks.  
    All welcome! 
    See the TTT events calendar for all the dates and details. 

    The NEXT ‘Signs’ workshop is in the wonderful surroundings of the Wandsworth Oasis shop at Amen Corner on Friday 1st June from 4:00-5:30. 
    That’s at 234-250 Mitcham Rd, Tooting SW17 9NT.
    Have you ever done a creative workshop in a shop? Was it as amazing a place as the Amen Corner Oasis shop? You’ll have time to browse….and it’s half term, so all the family can join.

    We have lots of ‘Signs’ in many languages – all responding to this open question: “What would you like to say to welcome people who are new to the community?”
    They’ve been fascinating sessions which everyone seems to appreciate. Expressing ourselves, meeting others, making it visual and being creative by ‘thinking with our hands’ is a very powerful mix.
    A brilliant and valuable extra is that young people from the CARAS youth club have been joining in to gain volunteering experience co-facilitating a creative community session. 
    There’s been inspiring communication across the cakes and mint tea on the cafe tables. Young people who are refugees and asylum-seekers have enjoyed friendly venues they may not have considered visiting, and met many local people they would not otherwise have encountered.  

    Throughout there’s been interwoven threads of self-expression plus a two-way invitation to ask questions and share experiences.


    We have a vivid record of the sessions in the shape of the Signs themselves. They’ll be included in a local exhibition during Refugee Week, June 18th-24th: details to come. The materials for the Signs are re-purposed from publicity boards from the wonderful Work and Play Scrapstore. We had one of our workshops there, and met this Japanese architect who joined in (with a translation on the back):
    These workshops are part of our partnership with CARAS throughout 2018 – the partnership purpose throughout the year will be to facilitate events which draw refugees and asylum-seekers and the local community closer together. For more about the year’s projects, please click here, and there are lots of pictures on our TTT Facebook pages. 
    Many thanks to the partnership funder ThriveLDN, an initiative by the Mayor Of London .


  • ‘Signs of Welcome’ free, creative, hands-on & local workshops from March to June 2018

    In March we started our run of ‘Signs of Welcome’ creative workshops, and between now and June we’re offering more public hands-on events with local project partners. 

    In the workshops you’ll explore your responses 
    to this open question: 
    “What would you like to say to welcome people who are new to the community?”
    You’ll imagine what message you would like to say to refugees, asylum-seekers or others new to the community.
    You’ll design and create signs to express your message.
    You can take them home or loan them to us for exhibition during Refugee Week in June.

    The next two events are in the Easter holidays:

    Date:  Wednesday 11th April  
    Venue: Tartine Artinasal
    9 Upper Tooting Road, Tooting Bec, SW17 7TS 
    Timings: 4:00 pm to 5:30 pm

    Date:  Friday 13th April 
    Venue: Home Community Cafe
    St Andrew’s Earlsfield, Garratt Lane SW18 4SR
    Timings: 1:00 pm to 2:30 pm
    What to expect: 
    • All welcome to join us for a free, facilitated and fun crafts workshop using re-purposed materials – we’ll provide everything you need 
    • Design and create your own messages of welcome to people new to the community
    • Adults and children will all enjoy the workshop 
    • No need to book
    • We’ve included weekends and afternoons after school to allow children and families to take part together 
    • Take the signs home, or leave them with us for exhibition during Refugee Week in June 2018
    • Workshop run by Transition Town Tooting and CARAS (the Tooting charity serving refugees and asylum-seekers)

      Thanks to our local partner the Work and Play Scrapstore in Tooting, the signs will always be made using materials saved from going to waste. 

      Write your signs in any language!
      Design a message using both sides of your sign!

      Many thanks to all the local partners hosting free Signs of Welcome workshops, including:

      • Fridays March 10th & 23rd. The Sound Lounge, Wimbledon

      • Wednesday April 11th. Tartine Artinasal, Tooting Bec

      • Friday April 13th. Home Community Cafe, Earlsfield

      • Friday June 1st. Wandsworth Oasis shop, Amen Corner

      • Saturday June 9th. Paradise Co-operative, Earlsfield

      • Friday June 15th. Sprout Community Arts, Furzedown
      We’ll share the details of each workshop closer to the time. 

      This project is a strand of the 2018 Welcoming Signs partnership between TTT and CARAS and local venues and other supporters. The purpose throughout the year will be to facilitate events which draw refugees & asylum-seekers closer together with the local community.

    • Funding awarded for 2018 ‘Welcoming Signs’ partnership with CARAS. Plus: new creative community workshops running March-May.

      We’re planning the fourth year of TTT’s partnership with CARAS the Tooting charity working with refugee and asylum-seekers. 
       
      We’re thrilled that the partnership has been awarded funding for 2018 from Team London and Thrive LDN’s ‘Young London Inspired’ fund: “improving the lives and mental health of young Londoners by helping them to volunteer”.

      So, in 2018 one of our main focus areas will be enabling young people from CARAS to volunteer in the community. That means working with young people to imagine and design what they could contribute locally and what benefit that would have, as well as carrying out the voluntary time.

      The whole 2018 young people’s partnership is called ‘Welcoming Signs’. Many elements of our CARAS project involved community benefit and relationships in the past: for example these pallet-benches made with the CARAS Youth Club with welcoming invitations written in many languages had starring roles at TTT’s Tooting Twirl in July 2017:

       

      We’re fortunate and grateful that several local partner organisations in Tootings have been ‘reaching in’ to CARAS, seeking and offering voluntary projects. 
      We’ll share more very soon on the range of activities we’re exploring. 

      Plus we’ll continue to work through 2018 with other age groups served by CARAS: families, the women’s group, adults.

      The first community events with young people from CARAS included as contributors are starting in the next few weeks: on March 16th and 23rd we’re facilitating Signs of Welcome workshops across the border in Wimbledon, at The Sound Lounge pop-up venue. 
      It’s the same event run two times. 
      Six other local venues have agreed to offer more Signs of Welcome sessions between March and May as project partners. 
      The materials from the ‘Signs’ will always be re-purposed, saved from going to waste. Thanks to another partner, the Work and Play Scrapstore in Tooting for your support!

       

      The details: Signs of Welcome creative workshops this March

      “What would you like to say to welcome people who are new to the community?”

      Dates: Friday 16th March & Friday 23rd March
      Venue: The Sound Lounge, 8 The Broadway, Wimbledon SW19 1RE
      Timings: 4:00 pm to 5:30 pm
      What to expect: (download the flier here)

      o   All welcome to join us for a free, facilitated and fun crafts workshop using re-purposed materials – we’ll provide everything you need

      o   Create your own messages of welcome to people new to the community. You can write in any language!

      o   Take the signs home, or leave them with us for exhibition during Refugee Week in June 2018

      o   Adults and children will all enjoy the workshop

      o   We’ve chosen afternoons after school to allow children and families to take part together

      Tooting friends are welcome to come over to Wimbledon to enjoy the first workshops and the familiar faces at The Sound Lounge.

      Please contact Charles by email here if you have any queries. Up-to-date news on the workshops will be on TTT’s facebook page & shared by twitter.