You don't have to be a student to visit the Trade Fair as it will be open on Saturday 22nd August for visitors (you can find out more and register using the button on the right). In this post Becky Belcher tell us about how the Trade Fair team went about planning the trade fair for this year's summer school.
We at The Birmingham and District Guild of Weavers, Spinners and Dyers are primarily responsible for organising the Trade Fair at this year's Summer School. We want to make the Trade Fair as special and interesting as possible, so we have endeavoured to collect together some of the best names in textile loveliness.
Last year we had a "Six Guilds" event, so that was our starting point when thinking about who to invite to trade at Summer School 2015. We then contacted the tutors booked to teach at Summer School. We wanted to solicit their ideas for which traders would be specifically good to invite, in terms of what students might want to add to their own collections of tools and equipment and fibres, pertinent to their new and developing skills from their Summer School classes. We also thought about traders that we had seen at shows ourselves, and who we thought may be good to have at the Trade Fair.
Then we sat down and made a list ... we wanted choice amongst the disciplines, but had to weigh that against not having too many traders representing any one aspect of our crafts. We sent out packs to prospective traders. Some were already busy, with holidays and other commitments. However, the final list looks good.
Cyndi, Kate, Carolyn and I joined Chris, Abigail and Ann on a site visit to Moreton Morrell. We saw the hall, took more measurements and generally got a clearer idea of how the hall will be laid out. Chris, the convenor, who looks after everything, has been busy adding traders' websites to the blog. This is great as individuals can now order specific things and traders will hopefully be able to accommodate customers and bring things along to the Trade Fair.
Traders themselves are adding short descriptions of their stalls and wares to the blog, almost daily, generating a keen interest, and a "must go to" date in the diary for all fibre lovers. Traders have also donated special prizes to our raffle, which are also being listed on the blog. These tickets will be on sale at the Trade Fair on both days.
We hope to raise a lot of money for the bursary fund, for future Summer School attendees, so make sure you not only get tickets for yourself, but remember to get your friends to order some tickets, too!!!
Becky
Friday, 24 April 2015
Sunday, 5 April 2015
Past the six month stage - getting ready ...
During
this past month students have been receiving their messages from tutors
and the summer school team have been visiting Moreton Morrell to plan
out how the spaces will best work for us now that we know what we want
in terms of teaching and social activity. We also know how many of you
will be joining us.
Some information has been added to the website which is of general interest and could be handy when planning your trip.
- The programme -
gives you an idea of what will be happening while you are there. We
will explain more about the visits, talk, auction, fashion show and
party in future blog posts as we get closer to the event.
- Travel to the venue
- has been updated with information about the minibus service and the
taxi costs. We also have set up a simple scheme to help would-be car
sharers identify people looking for transport and those who may be able
to offer it. A direct link to this form is here.
- Trade Fair - is one of the things that students look forward to. We have a good range of traders lined up and listed on the website. This will be open to students (only) on the Friday evening but open to others too on the Saturday. We hope that many guild members not attending as students will visit us then. Each trader has donated a prize to what promises to be a very tempting raffle.
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