Increase your household resilience by learning how to create clothing, household and decorative items using new or re-purposed materials, and how to maintain and repair the ones you already have! This full weekend of workshops and classes will expand the possibilities for fiber and fabric arts and crafts in your life, as a hobby and/or as a way to contribute to your household economy.

All sessions are hands-on and  taught by local experts. You can attend the whole weekend, one day, or individual workshops, as you wish.

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Schedule

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Workshop Details

(See below for location, cost etc)

Fabric Painting: create a banner for home or garden
Explore several types of paint to create banners. A range of fabric and paint will be provided. Bring images you might want to play with!
Materials Fee: $5
Instructor: Elaine McKee

Embellishments and Accessories with Crochet
Learn to create 3 dimensional leaves, flowers and cute animals using crochet techniques. Embellishments can be added to existing hats, scarves, gloves or sweaters; or can be converted to accessories like hair clips, pins, necklaces, bracelets or rings. This workshop is great for beginners with some basic crochet knowledge of how to chain and perform single, double and treble crochet stitches evenly. We will learn some basic pattern reading as well as how to create your own variations or even patterns. If you have crochet hooks please bring them, a limited number of crochet hooks will be available during the class.
Materials Fee: $5 provides yarn
Instructor: Juhli Jobi

Off-loom weaving
Using a nail-on-board technique of tapestry weaving, we can explore yarns and color. Have fun and learn. Bring any colorful yarn bits to add to the mix, or not. I will bring boards , yarns and needles.
Materials Fee: $15 provides a weaving board to take home, needle, and yarn
Instructor: Hana-Louise Braun

Fibre, Stitch and Story FULL
Fibre, Stitch and Story introduces participants to a collection of basic hand stitches, working with fabric, fibre and embellishments to create decorative, functional and story-filled blocks. The resulting blocks are suitable for clothing patches, wall hangings, stitch journals or whatever your imagination desires. A creative hands-on session, perfect for beginners or seasoned sewers. No sewing machines or technology required.
Session 1 will cover stitch basics samples, creating the foundation cloth, and development of story image
Session 2 will continue the ‘development of story image’, stitching down, embellishment and finishing

What to Bring:
Note… these supplies will be available in limited quantities at Fibre Space, but recommend participants bring their own if possible.

• scissors – thread, fabric, paper
• assorted sewing needles, straight pins, pin cushion
• thimble, needle threader if used
• dark and light pencil crayons
• pencil sharpener, small ruler
• white sewing thread
• bits of lace, ribbon, beads, cotton fabric scraps

Materials Fee: $7 provides foundation cloth squares -2 sets per person, perle cotton, embroidery floss, special needles, as needed, to match the thread and assortment of cloth pieces and embellishment supplies
Instructor: Wendy Drummond

Demystifying the Sewing Machine FULL
Cam will cover how sewing machines work (including example of a dismantled machine so you can see inside), home maintenance of your machine (with a tool list), mechanical versus electronic, and what NOT to buy. Then Shawn will show you how to ‘learn’ your own machine and not be intimidated by it, the importance of correct thread and threading the machine, and understanding tension.
Instructors: Cam and Shawn Bailey

Beginner Beading CANCELLED

Beginner machine sewing – make a set of cloth napkins FULL
Learn to use a sewing machine and make a set of cloth napkins for your home. Replace paper products, save trees and landfill space!
What to bring:

• Lightweight cotton or cotton-poly fabric, 1.5 – 2 yards
• Sewing scissors / shears
• Cotton or cotton-poly sewing thread to contrast with your fabric

Instructor: Kevin Wilson

Anatomy of a Garment: Patterns, Fitting, and Alterations
With a basic understanding of how patterns are drafted and a few simple tricks, you can adjust the fit of your patterns or alter your ready-to-wear garments for a better fit. This two-part workshop will focus on introductory skills for pattern fitting and alterations and is appropriate for beginning to intermediate sewers with some experience in making garments from scratch.

Part 2: Fitting Workshop FULL. 1.5 hours. Bring a pattern of your choice or a finished garment to be altered, and we’ll put our new skills to work helping each other determine how to improve the fit of our projects. Bring a project (pattern or finished/half-finished garment), a tape measure, and your pins. Tailor’s chalk or similar for marking your fabric (if your project is a garment) or tracing paper and scotch tape (if your project is a pattern) will make your job a lot easier. Max 4 participants in order to give individual attention.
Instructor: Erin Innes

Beginner Spinning on a Drop Spindle
Students will learn how to prepare wool fibres for spinning, basic hand spinning technique, and how to prepare hand spun yarn for use in other projects. No prerequisites. Students welcome to bring their own spindle but spindles will be provided in class.
Materials Fee: $10 provides 50 grams of carded fleece ready to spin plus hand out.
Instructor: Val McKeen

Cordage, Knots and Binding with Local Materials
Learn about local plant fibers that can be twisted into usable cordage, as well as some knots and binding techniques. This hands on course will include a discussion on the application of primitive or hand made cordage to survival skills.
All supplies are included
Instructor: Brian Lee

Screen Printing on Fabric FULL
Learn how to make an image into a silk screen and print it onto fabric. I will explain how silkscreens can be made and then demonstrate printing on fabric. We will talk about various mediums to use to print on fabric for lasting results. Everyone will have a chance to make something, and go home with a patch-size screen print.
Materials Fee: $5 provides a take-home screen-printed patch
Instructor: Amber Friedman

Nuno Felting on Silk FULL
Nuno means cloth in Japanese, and nuno felting into the cloth with wool, (in this case, we will use silk chiffon as our base cloth) came out of Australia in the 90’s… the wool fibres are actually worked into the silk to create a soft and pliable felt through a process using everything you’re never supposed to do to wool…..heat, agitation, and soap…..your basic laundry mistake!

Knit a Sock in a Day FULL
In the first session we’ll learn how to use circular needles to knit socks, and begin our sock by casting on and knitting the toe. You can knit as much as you wish of a foot during lunch, then in the second afternoon session, turn the heel and continue to knit the leg. The top ribbing and castoff will be completed at home. You’ll end up with a rather oddly proportioned sock but you’ll have the knowledge to knit your next pair to fit a real foot!
You will need to be able to knit, purl, increase and decrease with reasonable confidence.
What to Bring:

• two circular needles of the same needle gauge, but not necessarily the same length (at least 60cm, 24″ long, and 4-6mm gauge)
• Sport or double knitting or worsted weight yarn in a smooth, plain light color, about 50g. Fibre content doesn’t matter as long as it is not hairy or fluffy.

Instructor: Kevin Wilson

Event Logistics

Walk the Talk: this weekend aims to be zero waste and support local producers. Please help us reduce our carbon footprint by carpooling, biking, walking or using the bus to get to and from the site!

Date: Sat and Sun Jan 28 and 29 2017

Location: Fibre Space at Oceanview Education Centre, 7085 Nootka St – above Vancouver Island University.
Bus route 2 stops just down the hill from Oceanview.

Cost: 

Deposit $20 on registration, remainder due by Jan 15

Full Weekend: Early bird price $99 till Jan 7
Full Weekend: Regular price $135 from Jan 8 to Jan 28
Single Day: $75
Single Workshop: $30

You may pay up to 50% in Powell River Dollars PR$

Special deal: 15-19 year olds get in for only $40 for the whole weekend!
Work trades welcomed
Some partial scholarships available – contact Kevin directly

Register Here

Cancellation policy
50% refund up to 2 weeks before
No refund after that but you are welcome to send a substitute