Transition Town Tooting

Tag: Making

  • Jellybrella: TTT’s invitation to be creative

    A second set of photos of our Jellybrella creative workshop on May 11th. These  are all about the day as an invitation to be creative…welcoming people in new ways…and what participants thought about it.

    All the background on this participative creative community sustainability project is in a past blog post – please click here It includes “what and why is a Jellybrella?” 

    We asked for feedback and below there’s a photo of two of the evaluation forms completed on May 11th (click here to enlarge):

    We’re proud that participants found the Jellybrella day welcoming and inviting.

    Reaching parts we had not expected, David even wrote a very special Jellybrella song for one young girl who is a fan of Morrissey (think ‘Jacky’s Only Happy When She’s Up On The Stage’).

    May 11th lyrics here


    About 60 people came along on May 11th; over half were children. The participants were very diverse: half were english and half from many other places: several European and S Asian countries – and Mexico!

    In our earlier adult workshops in March and April the balance was 2/3 of participants from countries other than the UK.
    Lastly, everyone was from other countries in our February family workshop with CARAS refugee family participants. 65 took part in that workshop (2/3 were children).

    A total of 140 people of all ages and cultures took part in our 5 Jellybrella workshops.

    We’re going to write up our collective reflections on the Jellybrella project, and we’ll share our learning soon.
    And we’ll share our ideas for Jellybrella 2!

  • Making together to create a Jellybrella on Saturday

    We were thrilled with the Jellybrella creative workshop on last Saturday May 11th which we facilitated at Sprout Arts in Furzedown as part of the Wandsworth Arts Fringe.
    The weather was mostly kind and we did most of the day outdoors. Thanks for all the support and to Nikki, David, Jane & Chuck for facilitating.

    Lots of people came and many of them worked together – parents and children, friends, siblings, grandparents and grandchildren – as well as others who created solo.
    It was fascinating to experience the energy of all these different relationships expressed in making together. 

    Do you work closely, or independently? Is there a plan or are you both developing the Jellybrella as you go along? Who’s leading? What’s the energy like – thoughtful, stimulated, quiet, noisy?
     

    These photos celebrate making together – and we’ll share some more sets of photos on other aspects: happiness, pride, fun, wellbeing, surprise, working with the re-purposed materials, the Jellybrella’s message & story. 


    Jellybrella has been fascinating and we have a lot to reflect on in terms of community participation and carrying off bold ideas.
    We also have more to share on the adult workshops that led up to this public event on Saturday.
    If you missed it, here’s a link explaining the Jellybrella project which we’ve been working with throughout this spring: https://tinyurl.com/y6t9pb9o

  • What combines creativity, community participation, charity, fun, repurposing waste, wellbeing, inclusion & shopping for good?

    Jellybrella does! (now we know…)
    On the Bank Holiday weekend and all next week: combine your love of creativity and fun with shopping in a good cause.

    Visit the super new Wandsworth Oasis shop at 61 Balham High Rd & admire windows full of Jellybrella creations. 

    The Jellybrellas were created last week by local adults with sight loss from Thomas Pocklington Trust Balham Resource Centre nearby: these two photos are from that workshop.

    Thanks so much to Gill the Balham Oasis shop manager for all the support collecting customers’ umbrellas since February and saying ‘yes, have the window!’ as a wonderful opportunity to share the joy of Jellybrella! Thanks also to Michelle the manager at Oasis Trinity Road and Joy in Oasis Mitcham Lane.

    Make your own Jellybrella on Saturday May 11th at our free public workshop at Sprout Community Arts – all the details at tinyurl.com/y6t9pb9o
    What will your Jellybrella be like? 
    We can’t wait to find out!
     

  • Jellybrella creative workshop takes off on May 11th

    We’re thrilled to be running the Jellybrella creative workshop in a fortnight as part of Wandsworth Arts Fringe.
    Free and for all ages: all welcome to join us!

    We’re holding the Jellybrella workshop from 10:00 to 4:00 on Saturday May 11 in Furzedown at Sprout Community Arts.
    Bring an umbrella or two if you can – perhaps you can re-make a neglected one or celebrate your favourite loved brolly.

    We’ll get straight into making led by Nikki and Chuck, and at intervals our storyteller David will move us with tales of lost & found umbrellas & living with less waste. He’ll be helping us be imaginative and thoughtful about the links between being artists for the day and taking care of the health and wellbeing of our neighbours, community and city.
    We’ll finish with a parade right outside Sprout – and if it rains, there’s no problem as we’ll have Jellybrellas.

    To  book workshop places – don’t hesitate to bring the family – please visit Transition Town Tooting & Jellybrella event pages on Facebook here and send us a message.

    A bucket of donated brollies  – each of them waiting to be transformed by you into a Jellybrella.
    Come on May 11th to our creative workshop and find out the difference!

     

    We’re very grateful to Wandsworth Grants Fund and the Wandsworth Arts Fringe team for supporting Jellybrella.
    That’s all the May 11th workshop details; please read on for more of what we have learned so far while doing the Jellybrella project.


    Why transform umbrellas into Jellybrellas?  
    When we developed this idea in November last year we felt that re-purposing umbrellas would strike a chord. Umbrellas are practical and give us shelter, make us beautiful and fashionable, play roles in literature, style, faith and celebration, can make us private and isolated when we navigate a busy pavement in the rain. They are often discarded (look around in pubs and cafes – you are never far from a lost umbrella) – or maybe they are kept in a cupboard at home, perhaps neglected or superseded. We love them when they do their job…what value could they have at other times? All these values and relationships are rewarding to explore.

    Linking with local and global waste
    In the workshop we make the link with waste, plastics pollution in the oceans and the circular economy. Creating a Jellybrella makes those big challenges real as choices right here in Tooting.

    The similarity with a wonderful ocean jellyfish is obvious when our creations are in motion. Every item we use in the workshops is re-purposed – from many sources, from participant donations and in particular from two community partners, Wandsworth Oasis and Work & Play Scrapstore. Thank you so much for the support!

    Creativity and adventure 
    Making a Jellybrella is adventurous – maybe you like to have a plan and have a vision for what you want to create, or maybe you add materials until the right moment emerges to call it finished. Maybe you work solo or in a group…maybe adding to someone else’s creation. Experiencing them as sculptures, they can be static, folded up and rolled loosely or tightly; when opened they invite movement and expansive gestures. Take a look at a broken umbrella – simple and ingenious construction…what does it remind you of now?

    Wellbeing 
    Making together – ‘thinking with your hands’ – is beneficial and positive as a small group or community experience – and solo. Sometimes we need an opportunity like this workshop to encourage us…

    Think of all the links between being creative together and the Five Ways to Wellbeing:
    Connect, Be Active, Take Notice, Learn, Give.
    There’s a good description on the Mind website here.


    Come and explore all of the features of making a Jellybrella!
    Jellybrella workshops we have done so far with adult and family groups have revealed many fascinating aspects of the umbrellas we take for granted.  We’ll share more on the adult workshops carried out with seniors and with people experiencing sight loss or dementia.

    “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

  • ‘Stay With Love’: Gardens of Refuge Project update

    We’re reporting back every six weeks on the Gardens of Refuge Project. That’s our local project running throughout 2017 with refugees and asylum-seekers living in and nearby Tooting, alongside our project partners CARAS and The Grange.

    Our previous summary at the end of May can be read here.
    In June and July we’ve worked with the CARAS Saturday Youth Club. 

    Elly Brown, MD at CARAS says:

    “We’ve already witnessed the
    transformations that take place
    when people from far and wide
    can use their skills and knowledge
    to create something shared.”
    What have we been doing together?
    ‘Stay with Love’ Making instant pallet benches:

    In one mighty 4-hour session, a loose and changing group from the CARAS Youth Club co-designed, shared ideas, problem solved and brought in new team members to make four of these pallet benches.
    Hats off to that dedicated group whose pride meant they insisted on eating their communal lunch sitting on the new benches.
    Part of the production line was to write messages of welcome and invitation on the seat backs. 
    These are in many languages.
    These young people have come to the UK in search of a welcome, safety and to put down new roots. It’s poignant that they felt comfortable to contribute their own personal invitations so directly to all-comers.

    These benches went on to the pop-up village green of the Tooting Twirl and now they’re in the Community Garden. Come and have a seat!
    ‘Stay with love’ as one young man wrote
    on a bench.

     

    Beetles and Bees 
    Making planters for Hillbrook School:

    Construction was more straightforward than the benches. With carpentry finished quickly, in June we painted the new planters cream.

    In parallel we spent time drawing insects (real and imagined) – offering this in the crowded hall alongside ping pong, pool and games. It was a fun experiment to have youth clubbers drop by the ‘insect table’ to sketch….a new experience for everyone.

    Our plan was to scan these drawings to make laser-cut plaques and cut-out insects to fix  onto the planters as fascinating decoration.
    It worked! Many thanks for patience & persistence to Dermot, the South London Makerspace and Nicola.

    Passing around these 3-D cutouts at the start of the following sessions, everyone could see the young people’s feelings of ownership and achievement.

    The planters were delivered to Hillbrook School this week. In September we’ll have a celebration there with youth club members to ‘cut the ribbon’ to launch children’s growing in the beautiful planters.

    PLUS: We’ve continued to work alongside young people looking after the planting done over 3 years at the CARAS office and the Hall around the corner. Thanks Rose, it’s looking very good!

    Now we’re planning the next steps for the Family Days we’re facilitating in August in the Community Garden.

    We’ve also begun to explore what we can do together with a new CARAS beneficiary group – single adults who don’t join the family days or the youth club.

    If you would like to co-facilitate or contribute your time or materials to the Gardens of Refuge project – please email us, we’d love to discuss it.
    – Charles

  • Gardens of Refuge project: updating you on 4 fascinating strands at the end of May

    We’re sharing our monthly update about Gardens of Refuge.
    Gardens of Refuge is our 2017 partnership project with CARAS and The Grange to provide therapeutic and positive experiences for people of refugee and asylum-seeking backgrounds who live in South-West London.
    There are four interrelated project strands to share:
    > Carpentry project with the Youth Club  
    > Family Activity Days
    > Vertical gardening with the Youth Club  
    > A 4-day trip to The Grange in Norfolk 

    1. Carpentry project with the Youth Club 
    We’ve developed a relationship with a nearby primary school who need planters for their own outdoor space.

    Led by Dermot, last weekend we began a series of 3 sessions to build and decorate these planters. The young people took on the design brief and modified the build based on other planters we have made together. In this case we’re making beds that are low enough for young children to use, and also tough enough to stand up to inevitable playground clambering.

    The session ran to twice its expected length because there was so much energy!
    Later on we have access to laser-cutting equipment or 3D printing to make plaques to fix to the beds.

    2. Family Activity Days
    This half term we have helped facilitate the fourth Family Day of 2017 – partly social, partly to do an interesting activity, partly to join together for a meal (allowing for Ramadan).


    Led by Jeni, we continued our mural project – the delightful idea of a ceiling decoration, based in images of water, for the underneath of the 4.5 metre-long rainwater catchment roof at the Tooting Community Garden.
    We started with impromptu storytelling in groups of 3 people of all ages, based on graphics done in April’s session.

    Stories have a beginning, a middle and an end, and each person supplied one of those – whatever their age.
    For example, using a painting of a snowflake, one story ran: ‘Once upon a time a beautiful snowflake was gently falling…..then the sun came out….and the snowflake turned to water and went plop on my head’. Hearing 9 or 10 of these imaginative stories was fantastic!

    Tuned up to be creative, we turned to painting details of our water images – either swirls and waves or drops (or petals…) – on the fascinating range of recycled scrap materials – metal, plastic, wood, CDs, buttons. (All from our friends at the Work and Play Scrapstore). Later we’ll arrange all these on the rainwater collector ceiling when we offer two Family sessions at the garden itself.

    3. Vertical gardening with the Youth Club
    In March and April Youth Club members made a pair of planters out of scrap pallets.  Since then we’ve been involving young people who want to work in depth with plants and keep all the planting looking good – all led by Rose, our team gardener.

    Each pallet has 3 very narrow beds, and we fixed them to the outside of the railings at the CARAS office at Blakenham Road. Both pallet-beds are planted with young plants grown in Tooting at Share Garden.
    Go and have a look – the beds symbolise the young people’s wish to look outwards, to interact with the wider community, to make something attractive for all to appreciate – and to enjoy the process.

    4. A 4-day trip to The Grange in Norfolk
    Earlier in May a group of 8 of us went to The Grange near Norwich – a respite centre combined with gardening and much more that CARAS has been to several times over the past 2 years. We were 4 young people from 3 countries, plus 4 adults from 3 countries, all helped by the two Grange hosts.

    We lived in the comfortable old house within ten acres of farmland, walked in the woods, looked at moths and grass snakes, cooked our meals, made bread and pots, made plant prints, played a lot of instruments and games, played with our mobiles.  On the middle day a larger group of 15 local people, including other refugees, joined for the weekly work day when a big list of jobs was tackled.

    The purpose is to have a positive, enjoyable, safe time together in a setting that is totally different from Tooting.
    It was a big privilege to join and help facilitate!

    Remember our Gardens of Refuge funding campaign and success?
    A proportion of the funds helps CARAS attend The Grange.
    More trips are planned for 2017.

    Thank you for reading about these diverse activities. We believe they add up to experiences which are valuable for all of us involved: we’re all beneficiaries.

    If you are interested to contribute either your time or other resources to help these projects – at a distance or hands-on – we’d love to talk about that. Please contact Charles by email.

  • Pedalista Workshop – This Tuesday!

    Could you be a leader in making, could you become a Prime Pedalista? 

    Hello Pedalistas*

    Tour De Tooting is fast approaching.  Pedalistas of Tooting will be looking to get making and decorating throughout June in preparation for the Parade of Wheels on the 3rd July.

    This Tuesday, Tour De Tooting are hosting a workshop of making and decorating to prepare you to share techniques with friends, family, community groups , school pupils and more.

    Could you be a leader in making, could you become a Prime Pedalista?

    *A Pedalista is anyone who is excited by the idea of celebrating the freedom and liberation of the wheels in their lives.

    Tuesday 7th June
    6:30 – 8:30
    Work and Play Scrapstore, Hazelhurst Estate, 13 Blackshaw Road, London SW17 0DA

  • Resparkle! plus Meet & Make: Free upcycled crafts activities in Tooting next weekend

    Two long-running TTT crafts projects which mix creativity and attractive recycled materials are coming together on December 12th at Tooting Library.

    Reduce, Re-use, Resparkle! has been offered with our partners Tooting Library at Christmas for the past four years.
    Meet & Make is community artist Jeni Walker’s monthly project for local upcycling and making.
    On Dec 12th we are bringing them together for a free event.

    Resparkle! is all about making fun Christmas presents or decorations out of recycled materials – do come along from 2-4 at Tooting Library on the 12th. All ages, all welcome, all materials provided.

    The regular attendees (and others!) at Meet & Make are invited to come along too – make some great upcycled festive decorations and also get some inspiration and encouragement on any making project of your own. All artists and makers welcome.

    Three inviting photos from last year’s Resparkle! –


    More Meet & Make news:
    Our newly formed connection with local charity Wandsworth Oasis was knitted a little closer last month with the generous hosting of our monthly Meet & Make in their new shop near Amen Corner. 

    Helen brought along the finished shopper trolley started at last months M&M, Jeni whipped up a couple of tiny aprons for her toddler art classes and Martin chatted at length about the possibilities and challenges of starting a social enterprise based on up cycled making.

     
    Elsewhere in the TTT arts story the power of making saw many hands came together to put paint, paper and glue to the Giant Saxophone. The friendly yellow giant was witness to young mums with their children, Pilates teachers, Meet & Makers, local arts practitioners, people claiming that they ‘aren’t any good at this art stuff‘ another saying they ‘literally hadn’t made anything in years’ all creating a very pleasing result both visually and in the sense of connecting together.
    We have plenty more participatory making planned – please come and get involved, and also do share your ideas for new projects or community groups and partners to join up with. 
    Contact us at transitiontowntooting@gmail.com

  • Shelter – the theme for our 5th Tooting Field Day

    On Sunday August 2nd we focused on Shelter.  
    Each family Field Day safari has a theme that’s about enjoying the local outdoors, creativity and also low-carbon living. We’ve explored Travel, Water, Nature and more…and had a lot of fun together, and discovered parts of Tooting we didn’t know at all.

    What did we do?
    In the first part of the afternoon we met at Sprout Community Arts and made insect hotels out of re-purposed plastic bottles and cardboard (yes, packaging from Dan’s kitchen furniture). 

    These shelters are designed for ladybirds and lacewing flies – both are welcome predators on aphids. The results were fantastic!  Brilliantly decorated, with ideas zipping around the tables as children and adults thought of new techniques, and showed them off, and copied. Lucky bugs…we made over 3 dozen shelters.

    The second part of the Field Day continued the theme. 
    We walked to Tooting Graveney Common and built shelters and dens from willow branches (kindly donated by Lambeth Council).  Again, the creativity and healthy competitiveness that everyone displayed was inspiring. People also commented how much fun it was to hang out and play in the woods. 

    After a picnic (courtesy of Pooja, Arena and The Collective Dairy) certificates were awarded to the best dens in different categories by our young judges Dominic and Benji.
    At the end we followed the ‘leave no trace principle’, dismantling all the dens (after we’d taken photos to remember them by!).

    But what’s this on Airbnb? 

    One of the bottle shelters may have been left behind!

    It sleeps 16…and has 8 bathrooms…look it up and check out the spec.

    And look out for other Shelter-themed surprises you may find in Furzedown and Tooting – let us know what you spot. Including any sleeping ladybirds

    Thanks very much to all the helpers who prepared and led this wonderful day, and to participants for your energy!

    The last Field Day is on September 13th, part of the Tooting Foodival. There’s going to be a giant pea … all the info is available online here. All welcome, all ages, and it’s free.