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Visible mending club ... starts this Saturday!

We had such a great turn out to our visible mending class in Term 1 … and some requests for a regular opportunity to get together and chat and stitch … and learn new skills.

In response to this community interest, Serene (who ran the session last time) has offered to come along on the 1st Saturday of the month to run our new Visible Mending Club from 10-11.30am. You can bring along your clothes or pillows or towels or blankets that need mending … and tap into Serene’s skills and expertise to mend and perhaps even transform your beloved item(s) with beautiful stitching!

The slow art of visible mending is super rewarding and is a perfect way to relax. And these regular sessions will be a great way to get to know others in the neighbourhood who also enjoy the slow arts. The cost is $15 per session.

If you are keen to come along you can book in here.

The dates are:

  • Saturday 6 August

  • Saturday 3 September

  • Saturday 1 October

  • Saturday 5 November

Starting this week

Term 3 of Women in the Shed starts today - this Thursday at 10am. This program is fully booked again for this term and next - it is wonderful that we have so much consistent interest from our community!

We are also starting up our AAA Arts program on Fridays from 1pm. This course will combine painting, print making and woodwork and will be led by Clare with help from Corrado who has recently started volunteering with us on Fridays.

It is a free access all abilities program (please note that carers will need to stay and help if needed) that is kindly supported by our lovely Community Bank friends just down the road in Clifton Hill.

Winter art exhibition

We had a lovely night last Friday for our opening. Around 60 locals came along which was fabulous, and more popped in over the weekend.

25 artists were part of the event, and we thank Sharyn Madder, Beatrice Magalotti and Wendy Roach for hanging the exhibition.

We’d also like to thank Yarra City Arts for the seed funding to get this regular event in our calendar up and running and also thank the Community Bank on Queens Parade for funding the gallery equipment install.

We have so many talented artists in our community. If you are keen to see more local art in real life or join us for another fun community event (being the opening night) keep an eye out for the Alphington Open Studios Weekend coming up on the last weekend in November!

Slow stitching and visible mending

With climate action in the forefront of peoples minds, reduce, reuse and recycle are steps we can each take to make a difference.

This is especially true for our clothes and the fast fashion industry that seems so disposable.

Learning how to repair those loved items rather than buy new and replace is a great start - and very satisfying.

The art of visible mending and slow stitching have become increasingly fashionable skills that also help extend the life of our clothes - keeping them from landfill.

And … these skills also create moments of mindfulness to enjoy and help us slow down!

Serene Paul is a talented local artists who does beautiful eco-dyeing and hand stitching to create art and repair clothing … and we are fortunate to have her returning to the Alphington Community Centre to share her talents.

She has been a maker all her life with sewing a childhood obsession, followed by studying fashion design and working in the fashion industry for a number of years. She is slowly building her own handmade and thrifted wardrobe and likes to make each piece unique by using hand stitching techniques along with patching, natural dyeing and appliqué.

Serene will be running a one-off Slow Stitching workshop on Saturday 20th of August from 10am-2pm. She will show you the stitches and you can practice them yourself with a kit that is provided. The cost is $50 and you can enrol here.

She will also run a monthly Visible Mending session. Bring your project and sew and chat and share skills. Join Serene from 10-11:30am on the first Saturday of each month by enrolling here.

Please keep in mind that each workshop and each group requires a minimum number of people to attend for it to run. So if you are keen and know other friends that share your interest then please enrol and encourage your friends to join in too!