Festival : Workshops
Chorlton's Big Green Festival was founded to help people learn about sustainable living and nowhere is this more important than in the workshops and information stalls. CBGF workshops provide practical and interactive demonstrations ranging from the likes of community group Rubbish Revamped who have taught festival-goers how to make ornaments out of recycled items and Cracking Good Food who have provided interactive cooking demonstrations at past events.
This years workshops range from well-being demos to dance classes to discussion groups and much more. Information stalls, staffed by local community groups and charities throughout the day, are another mainstay of the festival and show how everyone can live more sustainably and get more involved in local causes.
Children's Furniture Up-Cycling / Craftelicious
If you are thinking about re-vamping or up-cycling old or worn looking furniture and give them a lease of new life, then come along to our stall. We will be having an interactive session allowing people of all ages to take part in transforming children's furniture using 'Decopatch' paper. With activities for the little one's and children in us all, we will be providing advice and ideas to get you started.
Whether you're into craft or not, this is definitely fun for all the family!
Clog Dancing with Liz Calderbank
This traditional Lancashire dance form, which developed in the Lancashire cotton mills where wooden-soled clogs were the standard footwear and the workers tapped their feet to the rhythm of the machines. It is a percussive dance form (somewhat similar to 'tap') using mainly the feet and not the upper body. Liz teaches fortnightly classes on Saturday mornings in the back room of the Beech Inn, Chorlton.
See the Manchester Clogging group on facebook for details.
1.30 – 2.15pm at the School Hall
Cracking Good Food / Stretford Pizza Ovens
A not for profit community cooking network, intent on teaching people how to cook tasty, affordable, seasonal food from scratch, sourced locally. We believe everyone should have the right to good wholesome food. Good food isn't expensive if you know how to cook it. A trained chef will be showing you how to make pizzas from scratch, with the guys from Stretford Pizza Ovens cooking it up in their wood fired oven. No more than 8 in a group. You then eat what you've made. 4 sessions – 32 places. £6 for a working participant but free for those unemployed (proof required).
Footage of Stretford Pizza Ovens at the CBGF last year is here
Garden Share with Transition Chorlton
We've spent this weekend getting ready for Chorlton's famous Big Green Festival, putting together a few things for our stall. If all goes to plan we'll have created a lively little gardening area along with pop-up farm and Chorlton Nursery. On the day we hope to have a few small activities going on.
First of all we've got a nice big map of Chorlton for people to "pin" their garden's to. This will make it easier for us to see where free spaces exist and (hopefully!) let us pair the spaces up with some enthusiastic growers. Going to aim to have a picture of the map up soon so you can check it out in advance.
Secondly we're going to be making some seed bombs! You can find out a bit more about what seed bombs are here, and a good video guide to making them here. Seeds and compost for this are being very kindly provided by Chorlton Nursery who will be helping out with making them on the day.
Click here for more information
The Hug Project is creating a system and a brand for a better way of life. To find out more, come to the workshop tent. Hug are proud to introduce to the festival, a collective of fantastic projects all based around salvage, restoration, reuse and recycling:
- Hug Chair Restoration - Come and see a demonstration of chair 'upcycling'. Find out how to turn that tatty or unloved piece of furniture into a thing of beauty! Or if you don't have a chair, don't worry, we've recently salvaged 3 shipping containers full of chairs destined for the fire!
- 'The Hug Recycling Company' are providing all the waste and recycling services for the festival for this year. We will also be demonstrating some useful ways you can help us save reusable items going to landfill.
- 'Noisy Toys' - A spectacular hands-on interactive sound installation. Have fun playing with noises, making original music, experimenting with sound and learning how it works. The Hug Project is working with Noisy Toys, to develop useful ways to reuse obsolete electronic equipment. Come and make some noise! Participants may be asked for the costs of parts of any instruments that they would like to take home, such as connectors, microphones etc. This will usually be £2 - £5 only. Hard Drive cost £5 unless you bring your own.
- 'Junk Jam' is an innovative carnival arts project that relies on recycled materials to create a cross-cultural, multi-discipline carnival presentation. The Hug Recycling Company is the official materials supplier for Junk Jam. Click here for more
Iyengar Yoga with Clare Tunstall
Iyengar Yoga is a stimulating form of exercise whereby postures, or asanas, stimulate the whole body, toning muscles, improving posture, increasing circulation, invigorating the nerves and organs and restoring strength and stamina bringing vitality to the body.
Learning about the alignment of postures, asanas, brings concentration and clarity to the mind whilst exercising the physical body. Iyengar Yoga will keep you healthy and active in both the emotional and physical sense.
Workshop suitable for children and adults. (Children must be supervised/accompanied by a parent/carer)
3.30 – 4.15pm at the School Hall
Organic Growing with Vegan Organic
Click here for more information
Pilates with Sarah Hudson Jones
St Clements church has been the home of energyflowfitness Pilates classes for nearly 10 years, we started back then with 1 class on a Monday and now have classes here Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday plus regular weekend workshops.
The energyflowfitness Pilates taster sessions will give you an insight into how Pilates works to strengthen the body and rediscover good posture. We know how modern day living keeps many of us desk bound and slumped throughout the day, come along to see how Pilates works to correct these imbalances, to open the body up and help you sit and stand tall, to help you breathe better, move better and ultimately look and feel better!
2.30-2.50pm and 2.55-3.15pm in the School Hall
Contact:Sarah Hudson Jones Tel: 07776196504
Popup Farm with Envirolution
Pop Up Farm is a food growing workshop that is aimed at children to create and decorate their own food growing unit.
The project will be launching a growing competition with all the schools in Chorlton to get the pupils thinking and interacting with food growing. Envirolution would like to see every pupil in Manchester have access to food growing!
The second part of the project is to create a Pop-up Farm, for an example, see Urban Physic Garden. We want to create an interactive space for pupils to engage with food growing and biodiversity. We have already began discussing with a Chorlton Primary School the idea of a Farm-acy to show the healing properties of plants.
Also, we are looking for Envirolution Ambassadors to join our growing team. The ambassadors will help spread the green message in the city and be trained to connect with their peers.
Spinning Workshop with Beetle Felt
Learn to spin almost anything and everything. Start by learning how to make yarn using a spindle and then you will be able to add bits and pieces to make your own unique yarn. This is a great way to use local sheep's fleece to produce a useful resource to use in your knitting, crochet and weaving. At Beetle Felt Studio in Chorlton you have the opportunity to get to grips with lots of traditional environmentally friendly crafts.
Beetlefelt studio offers fun and friendly workshops in sewing, felt making, weaving, dyeing, batik, silk painting, spinning and lots more. Have a look at the website for more details
Tai Chi with John Wilson
Tai Chi has it’s roots in Chinese martial arts and is a kind of moving meditation. It is practiced by millions across the globe and regular practice relaxes both the mind and the body.
12.30 – 1.15pm at the School Hall
World in Chorlton KnittingIn the Nursery area – all day
Come along and help create a lovely big green knitted/fabric display to represent our local and global connections. Individuals, groups and businesses have been busy over the last few weeks making their colourful contributions. Bring along any spare wool and knitting needles if you have them and add a piece of your own.
Get knitting for Chorlton's Big Green Festival!
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