26 Mar Get Creative with Thrifty Crafts at ACL Essex
Adult education provider, ACL Essex, is helping people upcycle and get creative with crafts. ACL Essex’s new range of creative craft courses helps learners save money and make the world a more sustainable place.
We all love watching the Repair Shop on TV, now we can learn these clever crafting techniques. Have you ever wanted to make your own clothes, re-upholster a beloved chair, or do woodworking and toymaking, but weren’t sure about how? Sign-up to a range of creative courses and ACL Essex’s experts will teach you.
Do you want to upcycle that comfy chair that badly needs some love and attention? Then take a look at what courses ACL Essex has to offer on upholstering for beginners and improvers and you can basically reinvent your furniture. You take your own piece of furniture along and see it transformed over the weeks, learning techniques such as attaching webbing and hessian and applying various layers of material. As well as being classroom based there’s the opportunity to use online learning technologies.
If you want to go one step further, why not try making your own furniture or artefact using hand woodworking techniques? Students will be provided with all the materials and guidance needed on using the correct tools, you can learn about the structure of trees and be accomplished enough to make a small wooden item.
There are also some great courses on textiles, such as ‘Textiles Your Gladrags’, upcycling clothes you haven’t worn in a while, as well embroidery and embellishment with beads, sequins and trimmings helping you to create your own individual piece and be really in vogue. There’s also a number of patchwork courses, enabling you to use up old pieces of fabric and create a stunning and warming blanket.
Giving children handmade toys is extra-special so make a unique gift with the help of courses on toymaking. An online four-week course shows you how to make soft toys with moveable joints that your little ones will treasure. There’s also an online course teaching learners how to crochet an Easter bunny!
Pioneering green futures at ACL Essex is Christian Norman – Vice Principal Curriculum & Learning. He said: “As we face a climate emergency, we all need to do our bit and consider how we can make the most of the items we recycle and reuse. Our creative courses give learners the satisfaction of making everyday items and also gives them the chance to see how we can upcycle items and give them a new lease of life.”
ACL Essex offers a wide range of qualifications and skills at their centres across the county and online. They also offer apprenticeships and professional learning, as well as core subjects, such as English, Maths, Science and Digital Skills. There’s also supported learning for people with learning difficulties, creative and cultural learning, mental health and wellbeing, plus community and family learning.
ACL Essex, part of Essex County Council, is the largest provider of adult education in the county. Our aim is to provide learners with as many ways to flourish as possible, to be there in communities across Essex, to make a difference to residents and businesses, so they can make a difference for themselves and to the places that they live in.
Learners enrolling onto a course which leads to a qualification may be entitled to financial support with; course fees, resources, such as textbooks or equipment, IT equipment, including access to Wi-Fi, transport costs and childcare. In addition, ACL Essex offers support to help learners start and stay in learning, if they have a recognised need, such as; dyslexia, dyspraxia, mental health, anxiety, processing, sight and hearing difficulties, mobility, learning difficulties, ASD etc.
