Event Details

Join The Ruskin for a felt bowl making workshop with artist Kat Wood and Shepherd Joanne Wood, and create a beautiful and useful wool bowl to take home.

Kat and Joanne will teach you the wet-felting method of binding wool, and through making and discussion, show you how versatile and sustainable wool can be. The bowls will be made from a combination of wool from Joanne’s own flock of sheep based in Chinley, Derbyshire and local wool from nearby farms which has been collected to prevent it from being burnt.

A sharp fall in the value of wool over the last two years has resulted in farmers burning it because the price no longer covers the cost of shearing. Wool now generates as little as 20-30p per kilo, which has led to hundreds of thousands of tonnes of UK wool being wasted.

Wool offers a number of environmental advantages: it is natural, renewable and biodegradable, and has proved itself to be measurably better in quality than synthetic alternatives.

This workshop aims to promote the Campaign For Wool and create a fair price for farmers, whilst encouraging direct relationships between farmers and makers, sharing skills and utilising waste by-products of the agricultural industry.

Kat Wood is a multidisciplinary artist working in fine art photography, alternative photographic printing techniques, performance and small publications. Her work addresses the relationship between the back-to-the-land movement, working northern hill farms and 18th century printing techniques. Her projects include You Can Lead a Horse To Water, that focuses on a new understanding of the rural as a place of cultural production.

Photos: Kat Wood

Lancaster Castle © Nick Dagger Photography via Lancaster Castle.