Tuesday 21 August 2012

New Stone Dance Pendants

Today's new product upload are eight new pendants crafted by Stone Dance.

 Using shaped and polished gemstones and a traditional macrame technique to encase some of them, the pendants above are Mexican Amber, Sunstone, Moonstone and Turquoise. Those below have been crafted from Malachite & Crystal, Petrified Wood, Fluorite and another using Mexican Amber.

For more information about these and more beautiful pendants from Stone Dance, please follow the link below:

Thursday 16 August 2012

Gaunts House Summer Gathering 2012 Review

Our most recent event was the Summer Gathering held at Gaunts house near Wimbourne over the weekend of 9th-12th August. Beautiful weather saw us all through the 22nd annual festival and it is safe to safe that everyone enjoyed themselves thoroughly at this charity event.

 The festival is recognised as providing a friendly festival atmosphere where quality workshops, therapies, speakers and inspirational music are readily found. This is one of our favourite festivals as it is as uncommercial as they get and full of happy chilled people either filling their time with workshop activities or just watching the the world go by.

 A new addition to this year's festival was Buddhafield Cafe (pictured below) which provided a large portion of the catering. It was great to see them there with their range of delicious organic meals.

 Laughter Yoga provided by Paul of Sundorlodges proved a popular morning workshop on the lawn where various types of forced laughter soon turned to uncontrollable giggles, cackling and plain old roars! It was a delight just to witness.

 It was a great pleasure to be back next to our neighbouring stallholders Hilary and Lee whose passion for stones and crystals is clearly shown by their display of handmade jewellery and knowledge of each gem's physical and spiritual properties. We certainly hope to be neighbours again next year.

For more information about Gaunts House Summer Gathering, please follow the link to their website.


Green Gathering 2012 Review

From the 2nd to 5th August we attended a festival that is new to us, but one that is known to many.
The Big Green Gathering was formed in 1994 and held in Somerset until its forced closure in 2009. It can now be found in Chepstow under new management and without the 'Big'.
  
The location certainly has enough room to grow, but at present the licence is for a festival of upto 4999 people. It remains to be seen if it will continue to grow to the size of the original Big Green Gatherings, but we wish it all the success.

The spacious grounds around the now largely ruined Piercefield House can be seen in the photo below.

Workshops involving most types of traditional craft have and will always be of interest to us and this festival allowed me to join a simple spoon carving workshop. I am not overly impressed with my first attempt and doubt the spoon will see any use, but I plan on improving in the future. Other workshops that interested me were metalwork and stonework, slowly slowly I hope to have a bash at these traditional skills.

The new regular site of Piercefield Park in Chepstow, Monmouthshire is a really beautiful part of the world with plenty of acres to grow and interesting walks. Nature is all around with rather mixed woodland, ruined buildings and caves nearby. Situated along the Wye river and valley it is acclaimed as an area of outstanding natural beauty.

For more information about Green Gathering, please follow the link to their website.



WOMAD 2012 Review

WOMAD festival needs no introduction as it's internationally well-known for its extensive selection of world music. This year was its 30th anniversary and the fourth year for Sorazora to exhibit at their current location near Malmesbury, Wiltshire. This year the dates were 27th-29th July.

Located by the Charlie Gillet stage, we were able to enjoy each days' line up on that stage whilst explaining the ins and outs of organic fibre production and natural dye techniques. This year's weather must have been imported along with some of the international artists as the sun shone continuously.

We'd love to say a big thank you to Kasia, who came to see us again, pictured below wearing our hempwool cardigan. We look forward to meeting again at another festival in the near future and hope the sun shines wherever you go.

Pictured below is one of the musicians from Japan's Marewrew & Oki who entertained us all with traditional Ainu songs. The man who grabbed our attention the most was Blick Bassy from Cameroon who blended jazz fusion with tasteful elements of his homeland's music.

 Terem Quartet from St Petersburg, Russia played an enjoyable blend of folk and classical at breakneck speed without a duff note. They were not only extremely talented musicians, but also highly entertaining to watch.

For more information about this annual festival held in Wiltshire, please follow the link below.