Pop-up Beard Book

If you like beards and pop-up books and have young children, then this is the workshop for you.

Make your own beard-themed pop-up creation in my next hands-on, half-term workshop at the Florence Nightingale Museum. For my return visit to this lovely venue located within St ThomasHospital, I’m taking my  inspiration from ‘The Age of the Beard’ exhibition currently on show there to deliver  three 1-hour family sessions encompassing 3D paper skills, design and illustration.

Learn how to make pop-ups with moving parts and how to assemble a finished book.

The workshops are suitable for 5+ with parents and carers. Adults will be encouraged  to take part but don’t worry, no experience necessary and results are guaranteed.  Materials will be provided, you just bring the creativity!

The workshops are free but normal entry fee to the museum applies. Booking is recommended.

Family Workshop: Pop-up Beards!
Wednesday 15 February, 11.00-12.30, 1.30-3.00 & 3.00-4.30

Admission
This workshop is free with admission

Booking details
Places are limited, to book please visit 
https://billetto.co.uk/en/users/the-florence-nightingale-museum-trust

Venue
Florence Nightingale Museum, 2 Lambeth Palace Road, London SE1 7EW

Time Machine Tutorial

For those who couldn’t make it to my recent workshop at Imagine Festival of the Arts in Sutton, here’s a video tutorial for the pop-up time machine. It comes in two parts: how to draw the time machine and how to make the pop-up. 

The theme of the festival was HG Wells – he lived in Sutton at one stage – and I based the time machine on the one in the 1960 film. I did take a few liberties: the time machine in the film doesn’t actually move location but instead the surroundings change as the date changes. I designed the pop-up to make the time machine look like it’s moving through time and space to give a more dramatic effect.

The basic abstract design is nice in itself and can be used to create all sorts of designs.

Imagine Festival of the Arts

I’m very pleased that Sutton Council was prepared to book individual practitioners and not just groups and organizations for their ‘Imagine Festival of the Arts’ this month. Yesterday, we ran two 2 full family workshops and an evening session with a smaller, but perfectly-formed, group of adults.

As always, one of the exciting aspects of the workshops was the mix of people who attended. I like to think that the activities I offer work regardless of background and highlight the similar ways we all approach visual 3D problem solving. The workshops also work well for those who speak very little English, offering a means of communicating through the making and designing process.

Popping up in Stopsley

Stropsley1

I was back in Stopsley Primary last Friday to see Y4’s finished pop-up books and to talk to the parents about the 2 day project. After learning a number of basic techniques on day 1 and sharing them between classes, the children went on to develop these in their own individual ways to produce books combining text, images and pop-ups.

I felt they had achieved a fantastic result and there were plenty of examples of where the children had experimented, come up with original ideas and managed to figure things out for themselves.

Stropsley2


One girl inverted the large V fold to create a parallel plane on which to stick a palm tree – hard to explain but it makes sense if you look at the picture (last one) – and I’m not quite sure how she figured this out. One boy created an arch based on the vertical V fold which probably would have been too complicated to teach to that age group in the first place. Unfortunately, no picture for that one but the point is they were able to come up with their own designs and techniques using what they’d been shown on the first day – very impressive!
Also worthwhile mentioning the wonderful teachers who took part in this, in particular, Jason Sutch who co-ordinated the project.

Stropsley3
Stropsley4

Britannia Village Primary

I was back at Britannia Village Primary School last Monday for Day 2 of our paper (cardboard) engineering project. As Year 6 set off for France with their giant pop-up constructions, Year 5s (3 classes) stepped up to the plate to start work on a pop-up reinterpretation of Alice in Wonderland set in London.

Britannia Village Primary sml

I was impressed by the way they took inspiration from Boxpark in Shoreditch, the surrounding streets and graffiti they photographed. I gave them guidance with the construction of the main framework and worked with a small team to get it in place and glued, while the rest of the children got to work on the other smaller components. They were given broad instructions for the painting of the structures but apart than that they were completely free to bring their own ideas to the final surface decoration.

Also very gratifying to see how all the teachers had used what they learnt in the initial inset session to help their pupils create small-scale pop-up pieces before my arrival.

World Book Week 2015

Back-to-back schools last week for the week of World Book Day. A lot of advance planning is always required for these but the enthusiasm of the kids and their eagerness to dive in and get creative always make it all worthwhile. This year’s schools were St. Pauls in Friern Barnet, All Saints in Fulham, Coppermill Primary in Walthamstow and St. Pauls and All Hallows in Tottenham. Here’s the montage:

book week 2015

Pop-up books workshop – 3Corners Centre

I’ll be running a workshop as part of Islington Exhibits, organised by Rowan Arts. Irma will be assisting, bringing her own special expertise to the event.

Saturday 20 July 11am-3pm
at 3Corners Centre, Northampton Road, EC1R 0HU

Email events@therowanartsproject.com or call 07975 758 756 to book a place

Come and create your very own pop-up book – all materials and instructions will be provided. The workshop will explore themes of family traditions and the finished books will be exhibited at Bookends, 66 Exmouth Market from 22 July. After the book-making session, the group will be going to the Whitecross Street Party to join in the festivities

If you’d like to join us for the full-day session, which will cover more advanced techniques, please book in advance. Anyone who would like to join us for part of the day is welcome to drop in at any time.

Suitable for children (6+) and adults (children under 10 must be accompanied by a carer)