Craft Hatch: Sustainable Living Festival edition

A couple of Saturdays ago Craft Hatch kicked off its 2010 season with a market coordinated in celebration of the Sustainable Living Festival. It was great to see so many people wandering through the space again (no doubt due to some very nice publicity in The Age in the previous week), and here are some images from the day.

A big thank you to Andrea Daniel, Gemma Johnson, Hookturn Industries, Mae Finlayson, Morgan Wills, The Dusty Caravan (Hollie Maree Kelley), Spin Spin (Susan Fitzgerald) and TastyPixel (Sheena McKinnon).

Andrea Daniel

Hookturn Industries

Morgan Wills

Morgan Wills

Mae Finlayson

Spin Spin (Susan Fitzgerald)


The Dusty Caravan (Hollie Maree Kelley)


Gemma Johnson

The next Craft Hatch market will be taking place on Saturday 13 March. It's yet another special edition of the market, this time coinciding with the L'Oreal Melbourne Fashion Festival so you bet it'll be another grand affair!

Craft Hatch: this Saturday!

We've emerged into 2010 well-rested and optimistic for another incredible year for Craft Hatch, our market for emerging artists and makers. The first Craft Hatch of the year will take place this Saturday 13 February at our regular spot in the gallery of the City Library, 253 Flinders Lane from 11am to 4pm.

To celebrate our return, Craft Hatch has teamed up with the Sustainable Living Festival to present a program of artists whose practice is eco-friendly, and not to mention pocket-friendly as well! Joining us in February will be 10 fabulous artists, most of whom will be participating at Craft Hatch for the first time. We keep things fresh here at Craft Hatch! Only the freshest and the best for you after all.

Stallholders at the market this Saturday are:

Andrea Daniel (whose knitted cactus were featured in last Sunday's M magazine, a pullout in The Age, pictured above)

Anne Mason of LUcE Handmade

Gemma Johnson

Hollie Maree Kelly of The Dusty Caravan

BYO coffee cups from Hookturn Industries

Kylie Bickerdike

Mae Finlayson

Susan Fitzgerald of Spin Spin

Sheena McKinnon of TastyPixel



Morgan Wills

Here are the details again:

When: this Saturday 13 Feb from 11am - 4pm
Where: City Library gallery, 253 Flinders Lane, Melbourne

See you there!

Upcoming programs in February

February's looking to be a bumper month full of public programs and workshops. Here's a peek at what's to come!

Bookings are now open and places are still available for these events... but not for much longer so make sure you book your spot now to avoid disappointment.




Coming up first is Green up your craft practice, a professional development session presented by our pals Lara Olsen and Yann Burden of Energy Return. As part of Craft Victoria's participation in Melbourne City's City Switch program (where we're aiming to reduce our energy consumption by 20%), Lara and Yann have been dropping by CVHQ regularly to discuss green strategies.

As part of this, they've kindly agreed to present a talk on how to reduce carbon emissions and create a more environmentally sustainable business and artistic practice. Using case studies Matt Thompson of mattt bags and jeweller Natalia Milosz-Piekarska, Lara and Yann will talk you through various ideas and methods of greening up your craft!

This event will take place on Thursday 11 February from 6-7.30pm. Call us on 9650 7775 to book yourself in.



The ever-popular Make It, Design It, Fund It is back on again with our lovely guest speakers Parallel Studios' Anita Budai, Christabel Harvey from Arts Victoria, and of course not forgetting our very own Nella Themelios (CVHQ's Coordinating Curator). Learn about what you need to know when it comes to submitting an exhibition proposal!

This event always books out way in advance, so make sure you secure your spot by calling us on 9650 7775.

Starting this year is a brand new collaboration between our fine selves and the equally fine people at ArtPlay and Signal. Over the course of the year, we will be presenting 4 exciting workshops at ArtPlay and Signal, each facilitated by an exhibiting Craft Victoria artist and designed specially for age groups 8-12 (ArtPlay) and 13-20 (Signal).

To start things off is Gallery 3 exhibitor Adam Cruickshank. While Adam's workshop at ArtPlay Awesome Prizes has unfortunately sold out already, there are still several spots left at his Signal workshop Brand Identity Strategy. Catered towards young adults aged 13-20, 'Brand Identity Strategy' is about making your voice heard and concerns aired.

To book yourself, or your young 'un, into this great opportunity to hang out with the very knowledgable and learned Adam, call Signal on 9664 7900.

So there you have it, that's your February sorted!

Craft Victoria's green crusade

To welcome the new year, CVHQ is going green!

We're starting off with baby steps, and to get things going we've acquired a range of Keep Cups (pictured above) that will help reduce our coffee cup consumption - especially Nella and her 4 coffees a day, whoa!!!! - as well as a Pyrex containers and tupperware for takeaway food.

By 2010, we hope to reduce our electricity bills by 20% which we'll achieve mostly through big things like switching to energy-efficient appliances and little things like turning off the lights when not in use. It's the little things that add up after all! We've also ordered ourselves a Bokashi bucket which is a handy composter for organic waste. Mmm, compost.

So here's to an even greener 2010, we'll keep you posted!