John C. Campbell
Folk School
Online Classes
2024-2025
Learn with the instructors you love from wherever you are.
We're excited to offer online classes in cooking, fiber arts, music, dance, painting, woodworking and writing. Join instructors from John C. Campbell Folk School for classes that can be enjoyed from the comfort of your home.
More About the Classes
- Click the class links above to see complete details for each class, and feel free to contact us with any questions. We are available seven days a week.
- Student attendance will all be online.
- Students can connect to the online classes using most any tablet or computer with reliable internet.
- Most of the classes will be recorded. Those classes will be available for access by enrolled students for 30 days following the live class.
- To cancel an enrollment or request a refund, contact support@lessonface.com. For 30+ days before, we refund 95%. Between 30 and 5 days, receive a 75% refund. No refunds within 5 days of class start date. Materials kit fees are non-refundable.
- Optional Orientation and Closing Ceremony hosted from the Folk School campus will be offered for all classes that students can attend online.
- Many John C. Campbell Folk School instructors are available for 1:1 online lessons.
About Lessonface
Lessonface's mission is to help students achieve their goals while treating teachers equitably. Since 2012, we've hosted more than 30,000 students and 2,000 teachers for over 500,000 music, language, and arts lessons and classes online.
Folk School Class Calendar
Storytelling: Documenting Your Quilts
- • Instructor: Annie Smith
- • Price: $60
- • Date: June 1
If our quilts could talk, would they share our special stories? Each of the quilts we make contain stories that only we know; what was happening in our lives, in the world, our communities, our homes and in our hearts – when they were made. Just as important as the label is on a...
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Smartphone Storytelling
- • Instructor: Stephen Knifton
- • Price: $200
- • Starts: June 3
You can work for a corporation, thrive as a creative entrepreneur or do anything in between. But one thing is certain: if you’re entrusted with a brand or promoting your craft and skills -- everything begins and ends with social media. We showcase our art and design, celebrate our...
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Baltimore Machine Applique
- • Instructor: Annie Smith
- • Price: $150
- • Starts: June 5
Learn the art and craft of beautiful applique done by machine. Annie will teach you the basics of creating prepared edge applique, get the perfect stitch on your sewing machine for precise points, round curves and bias stems. Make a block that can be incorporated into a larger project,...
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Beginner BBQ: Smoke-Fire-Food
- • Instructor: Jeff Hornung
- • Price: $150
- • Starts: June 8
Learn the basics of BBQ from the comfort of your own home! This class will cover several methods of smoking. Jeff has you covered with disscussions about shopping for smokers, picking charcoal, building a proper fire for cooking with smoke. What all can you smoke? Jeff will share...
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Watercolors Made Easy! (June 2024)
- • Instructor: Joe Synan
- • Price: $300
- • Starts: June 10
Watercolors are not difficult! This carefully designed class will allow all participants to become comfortable creating watercolor paintings of various subjects and sizes, using a variety of painting methods. The class will explore background washes, color contrasts and complements,...
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"Celtic Ballads - Songs, Poems, and Stories"
- • Instructor: Bobbie Pell
- • Price: FREE
- • Date: July 8
Bring your guitar, fiddle, dulcimer, wooden spoons, voice, or just a good sense of humor to this workshop on traditional Celtic folksongs. Songs of betrayal, comedy, love, and romance will fill the air. Students will be exposed to the popular tunes and learn to compose narrative...
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Stash busters: Felt on a Bar of Soap
- • Instructor: Laura Berlage
- • Price: FREE
- • Date: July 8
Looking for a fun and easy project that will help you declutter your stash? Little bits of wool roving can have a way of stacking up after several kits or projects, and this is a fun and decorative way to use them up! Felted soaps last longer as well, and are beautiful in your home,...
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Freestyle Flatfoot Clogging
- • Instructor: Aubrey Atwater
- • Price: FREE
- • Date: July 8
Join renowned dancer, Aubrey Atwater, for a Freestyle Flatfoot Clogging class. Flatfooting is a traditional form of American step-dance with African, European, and Native roots. This class is open to all! Aubrey has joyfully and successfully taught many dancers online.
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Stash Busters: Stitch a Flower Pin Cushion
- • Instructor: Laura Berlage
- • Price: FREE
- • Date: July 10
Looking for a fun and easy project that will help you declutter your stash? Pin cushions are both decorative and useful (or yours could be a miniature pillow), and they are delightful to make. This vintage design is great for using up small quantities of fabric that you’ve kept because...
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Shepherding the Full Experience: Transforming the Wool from Our Sheep to Fiber Arts Education Online
- • Instructor: Laura Berlage
- • Price: FREE
- • Date: July 11
Join Laura Berlage, farmer, fiber artist, and contemporary Renaissance woman on an exploration of her sustainable homestead farm in northern Wisconsin, the sheep she and her family raise, and how the wool becomes an integral part of her diverse online fiber arts courses. From lambing...
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Wheat Straw: Harvest Time Weaving
- • Instructor: Linda Beiler
- • Price: FREE
- • Date: July 11
In this introduction to straw art class, you will learn how to prepare straw for plaiting. The plaits will be shaped into harvest tokens. Bring your imagination, and you will never look at a wheat field the same again!
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Poetry of the Natural World
- • Instructor: Bobbie Pell
- • Price: $140
- • Starts: July 15
POETRY OF NATURAL WORLD For those who love a well-turned phrase inspired by strong connections to nature, this class provides foundational information about poetry: style variations, imagery techniques, prose to poem mapping, and revision considerations. Uncloak the mystery of turning...
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Intro to Watercolor Painting
- • Instructor: Joe Synan
- • Price: FREE
- • Date: July 23
Join Intro to Watercolor Painting for a fun active painting experience with easy-to-follow demonstrations! In this class Joe will be demonstrating some basic principles of painting with watercolors, and you’ll get to make 3-4 small paintings within the hour.1
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Tapestry Skill Builders: Nordic Mug Rugs
- • Instructor: Laura Berlage
- • Price: $310
- • Starts: July 29
Inspired by traditional Scandinavian folk motifs, this course is great practice for weaving with hills and valleys pictorial technique as well as exploring how you can make all 4 mug rugs on your loom at once! Finished dimensions for the tapestries are approximately 4.5 inches wide...
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Monthly Fiddle Meetup
- • Instructor: Sally Jablonsky
- • Price: $100
- • Starts: August 5
Continue your Oldtime fiddle journey with Sally Jablonsky online! Learn how to play a new tune a month and play previous projects in review. All kinds of fiddle sounds are welcome! This class is geared toward those students who've completed an intro class with Sally previously, so...
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Stash busters: Embroidering with Loose-ends
- • Instructor: Laura Berlage
- • Price: $165
- • Starts: August 16
Embroidery doesn’t have to be just for cotton floss. You can use all kinds of leftover threads and strings for embroidery! In this fun and explorative class, Laura will show you how to take your stash and turn it into a beautiful stitchwork. Explore 15 different stitches from...
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Block Prints in Brilliant Color
- • Instructor: Jessica White
- • Price: $275
- • Starts: September 3
Find inspiration in the textures and patterns you see in the nature to create multi-color block prints. Learn how to print in layers of colors made from a single block as well as how to combine blocks in a single composition. You’ll use these blocks to create prints as well as to...
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"Fine Point Punch Needle Rug Hooking, Level-1"
- • Instructor: Laura Berlage
- • Price: $390
- • Starts: September 4
Explore the beauty and process of Oxford style punch needle rug hooking with a fine point punch (the “Mini” #14), which uses wool yarn in worsted to aran weight to create a delightful zinnia motif. For this technique, we stretch a monk’s cloth backing over a frame, then use our...
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Learn to Design Weaving with Fiberworks
- • Instructor: Jen Weber
- • Price: $200
- • Starts: September 4
Are you still doing your weaving drawdowns with a pencil and paper? Then it's time to trade in that pencil for a computer mouse! Learn to save time and explore endless drafting possibilities using the weaving design software Fiberworks PCW. Just like learning a musical instrument,...
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Oil Painting for the Total Beginner
- • Instructor: Emily Fox King
- • Price: $60
- • Starts: September 5
Unleash your inner artist and embark on a mesmerizing journey into the world of oil painting. Take the overwhelm away and jump into the rich medium of oil paints with the masterful Emily Fox King. This course is designed with beginners in mind and aims to provide an easy-to-follow...
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"Scandinavian Loom Beading, Level-1"
- • Instructor: Laura Berlage
- • Price: $285
- • Starts: September 6
Explore the beauty and fun of beading on a loom in the Scandinavian tradition! Inspired by designs from Nordic bandweaving, this class will take you from start to finish for making your own sparkly beaded bookmark. Learn about the historic use of loom beading and how a remarkably...
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English Country Dance on the Lever Harp
- • Instructor: Lorinda Jones
- • Price: $55
- • Starts: September 7
Learn to play an English Country Dance tune on the lever harp and simultaneously improve learning to play by ear. Right and Left hands taught separately with the goal of putting the two together by the end of the course. Music will be provided at the end of the class and made available...
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Flavor Profile World Tour 2
- • Instructor: Christy Seelye-King
- • Price: $200
- • Starts: September 8
Join Chef Christy on a tour of cuisines from around the world! In this 4-session class, you’ll learn the significant seasonings and ingredients that typify the flavors of the cuisine and lifestyle of each area. This time around we’ll be visiting Germany, Mexico, Oceania, and of...
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Intro to Tapestry Level 3 - Intermediate Pictorial Techniques
- • Instructor: Laura Berlage
- • Price: $550
- • Starts: September 9
Building on the skills and techniques we’ve developed in Levels 1 and 2, Intro to Tapestry Level 3 dives deeper into pictorial techniques. Expanding our warping repertoire, we’ll use a wool warp at 10 epi, along with doubled selvedge warps for a stronger edge for this finer weaving...
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Watercolors Made Easy! (September 2024)
- • Instructor: Joe Synan
- • Price: $300
- • Starts: September 9
Watercolors are not difficult! This carefully designed class will allow all participants to become comfortable creating watercolor paintings of various subjects and sizes, using a variety of painting methods. The class will explore background washes, color contrasts and complements,...
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These Haunted Hills: The Art of Sharing and Creating Creepy Stories and Poetry
- • Instructor: Lyn Ford
- • Price: $100
- • Starts: September 9
Light up your home with a mosaiced glass block. Great class for the student with glass tools to expand their basic mosaic skills while creating a FUNctional piece of art. We’ll start laying out our pattern and cutting on the 1st class. Students will finish adhering the glass at home...
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Book Making: Inbetween Binding
- • Instructor: Sara Dismukes
- • Price: $145
- • Starts: September 9
Incorporate several different techniques into this innovative structure. Create a hardcover case-wrap bookbinding combined with basic leathercraft. Belted hardcover books feature a decorative lay-flat binding and leather closure. Any skill level welcome; requires good hand-eye ...
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Intro to Broom Making: Turkey Wing Whisk Broom
- • Instructor: Nam Joti Kaur Khalsa
- • Price: $150
- • Date: September 14
Learn to weave an old traditional Appalachian style whisk broom! Whisk Brooms are handheld tools for the home and can be used in many different ways, from sweeping up small messes to dusting mantles and countertops. In this hands on class, each participant will learn to weave with...
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Ornamental Wheat Weaving: Learn to Plait Straw
- • Instructor: Linda Beiler
- • Price: $280
- • Starts: September 16
Unique Offerings: Wheat weaving and straw art In this introduction to straw art class, you will learn how to prepare straw for plaiting. Over the course of the week, several plaits will be taught. The plaits will be shaped into harvest tokens. Bring your imagination, and you will...
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Crochet a Spiral Beret
- • Instructor: Laura Berlage
- • Price: $100
- • Starts: September 19
Explore a unique crochet project that will have your friends asking, “That’s crochet?” It looks remarkably like knitting! That's part of the fun of this Spiral Beret pattern because the texture looks like herringbone stitch while still being crochet. Build upon variations of the...
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Introductory Sewn Books
- • Instructor: Anne Murray
- • Price: $270
- • Starts: September 24
This class introduces several relatively simple sewn bindings where the stitching is a decorative element. There will also be options for variations on each stitching style covered. Four styles will be covered: Pamphlet stitch with 3 variations; Japanese stab binding with 2 variations;...
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Class Performance – These Haunted Hills: The Art of Sharing and Creating Creepy Stories and Poetry
- • Instructor: Lyn Ford
- • Price: FREE
- • Date: September 30
Join the class performance for These Haunted Hills: The Art of Sharing and Creating Creepy Stories and Poetry
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"These Haunted Hills, Level 2: More on The Art of Sharing and Creating Creepy Stories and Poetry"
- • Instructor: Lyn Ford
- • Price: $100
- • Starts: October 1
Revisit these haunted hills and valleys. Gather more tales, folklore, tips, resources and reflections to use as prompts for your own short stories and verse. Creatively write and share with fellow story lovers from the safety of your home.
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Carve a Wooden Cooking and Serving Spoon
- • Instructor: Mike Cundall Jr.
- • Price: $100
- • Starts: October 2
Learn how to carve wooden cooking and serving spoons from green wood. Functional, beautiful, and fun woodenware that you'll use every time you cook.
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"Wool Embroidery, Level 1"
- • Instructor: Laura Berlage
- • Price: $200
- • Starts: October 4
Embroidering with wool has captivated imaginations since at least the Viking Age, offering beautiful and textured means for stitched expression. Dive into this world and learn about its many iterations over the centuries with this immersive introductory class, while stitching your...
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Traditional Old-Time Fiddling for Beginners and Beyond
- • Instructor: Kenny Jackson
- • Price: $125
- • Starts: October 6
Come to class prepared with a few basic skills (like how to hold the fiddle and bow, and get into standard tuning), a willingness to learn short phrases of music by ear, and with a few tunes already under your belt, and you’ll come away knowing a few more great old-time tunes sourced...
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"Celtic Ballads - Songs, Poems, and Stories"
- • Instructor: Bobbie Pell
- • Price: $200
- • Starts: October 8
Bring your guitar, fiddle, dulcimer, wooden spoons, voice, or just a good sense of humor to this workshop on traditional Celtic folksongs. Songs of betrayal, comedy, love, and romance will fill the air. Students will be exposed to the popular tunes and learn to compose narrative...
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Unlocking True Crime in Traditional Murder Ballads
- • Instructor: Cate Clifford
- • Price: $200
- • Starts: October 9
Using a traditional Appalachian ballad chronicling a true crime committed in North Carolina, attendees explore the history and basics of broadside ballads, the subgenre of “good nights”, and what they can tell us about crimes and criminals of the past. Participants receive resources...
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Stash busters: Bead a Shawl Pin
- • Instructor: Laura Berlage
- • Price: $100
- • Starts: October 11
Declutter your stash! Beading is beloved the world over, and it is a great way to gather up those odds-and-ends beads from your collection to make a beautiful shawl pin (or brooch, depending on how you finish the piece). We’ll use a single-thread technique to begin beading our...
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Banjo Songs: Sing & Hear the Banjo Ring!
- • Instructor: Susan Pepper
- • Price: $125
- • Starts: October 13
Explore a diverse selection of mountain songs that pair well with clawhammer banjo from mournful ballads to rollicking Old Time songs. Options will be provided for backing songs with chords as well as picking out the melody. Learn songs by ear with lyrics provided. You will come...
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Make Sheepskin Mittens with Wool Embroidery
- • Instructor: Laura Berlage
- • Price: $315
- • Starts: October 13
Jump into a cozy, interdisciplinary experience of all things sheep with this unique project! Explore Scandinavian-style wool-on-wool embroidery using hand dyed wool yarns from the instructor’s sheep on upcycled washed wool fabric, as well as learn how to stitch shearling sheepskin...
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Beginning Mountain Dulcimer
- • Instructor: Anne Lough
- • Price: $250
- • Starts: October 21
Got a dulcimer hanging on the wall? Time to take it down and try your hand learning basic melody and strumming techniques by ear or a simple tablature system. No musical experience is necessary to enjoy playing this beautiful, soothing, Appalachian instrument. You'll finish the week...
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"Class Performance - These Haunted Hills, Level 2: More on The Art of Sharing and Creating Creepy Stories and Poetry"
- • Instructor: Lyn Ford
- • Price: FREE
- • Date: October 22
Join the class performance for These Haunted Hills, Level 2: More on The Art of Sharing and Creating Creepy Stories and Poetry
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"Fine Point Punch Needle Rug Hooking, Level-2"
- • Instructor: Laura Berlage
- • Price: $375
- • Starts: October 23
Ready to add to your Oxford style fine point punch needle rug hooking skills? This Level-2 course in a cheerful cardinal theme will add to your foundation skills with new twists including stretching the backing on a gripper strip frame (frame not included in kit, and you are welcome...
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Ballad Singers Monthly Meet-up
- • Instructor: Susan Pepper
- • Price: $75
- • Starts: October 24
Warm-up your voice and body, learn a couple of new traditional ballads or old songs during each session and enjoy swapping songs with others. These sessions will inspire you to go deeper into your exploration of traditional song and to enjoy your own voice within a fun, supportive...
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"Wool Embroidery, Level 2"
- • Instructor: Laura Berlage
- • Price: $295
- • Starts: November 1
Build on your skills gained in the introductory course on wool embroidery to embrace color, layering, and a host of new stitches. From the painterly “long and short” to the sculped “burden stitch” or layered “battlement couching.” Learn how to reimagine classic favorites and interpret...
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Singing and Playing Traditional Folk Songs
- • Instructor: Aubrey Atwater
- • Price: $100
- • Starts: November 2
Sit "knee to knee" (or rather, screen to screen!) with Aubrey for a singing, playing, historical, and cultural adventure! Folk songs leave no stones unturned when it comes to portraying the human experience. Aubrey will draw from her extensive repertoire of traditional American,...
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Hammered Dulcimer: Next Level
- • Instructor: Anne Lough
- • Price: $100
- • Starts: November 4
Now that you can play melodies on your instrument, it’s time to have fun “dressing them up.” Explore basic embellishment techniques and learn the concept of using chord patterns to enhance and create interest in your tunes
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Freestyle Flatfoot Clogging from Scratch
- • Instructor: Aubrey Atwater
- • Price: $100
- • Starts: November 4
Join renowned dancer, Aubrey Atwater, for a Freestyle Flatfoot Clogging class. Flatfooting is a traditional form of American step-dance with African, European, and Native roots. This class is open to all! Aubrey has joyfully and successfully taught many dancers online.
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Beginning Fiddle
- • Instructor: Sally Jablonsky
- • Price: $100
- • Starts: November 4
Start your Oldtime fiddle journey with Sally Jablonsky online! Learn how to hold the instrument, bowing technique and exercises, ‘what even is fiddle music?!’, and you will learn how to play a handful of tunes all while having fun. All kinds of fiddle sounds are welcome!
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Decorative Bookbinding
- • Instructor: Anne Murray
- • Price: $335
- • Starts: November 6
Learn 3 styles of decorative binding: Multi-needle Coptic Stitch with 2 variations and Long-Stitch variations. This class is for people who have had some introduction to sewn bookbinding and who are willing to work independently between classes. All materials will be provided to...
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Crochet a Twisted Headband
- • Instructor: Laura Berlage
- • Price: $100
- • Starts: November 7
Dive into this unique crochet project that will have your friends asking, “That’s crochet?” It looks remarkably like knitting! That's part of the fun of this pattern because the texture appears like the classic "moss stitch" while still being crochet, and the twist at the front...
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Let There Be Light: Glass Block Mosaic Lamp
- • Instructor: Linda Pannullo
- • Price: $200
- • Starts: November 7
Light up your home with a mosaiced glass block. Great class for the student with glass tools to expand their basic mosaic skills while creating a FUNctional piece of art. We’ll start laying out our pattern and cutting on the 1st class. Students will finish adhering the glass at home...
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Sashiko Stitching: An Introduction
- • Instructor: Beth Ross Johnson
- • Price: $167
- • Starts: November 7
This class will introduce Sashiko, a technique of Japanese functional embroidery that combines embroidery, patchwork mending, and quilting. Students will explore the history which is rooted in Buddhist textiles and the folk traditions of northern Japan, and learn the basics of two...
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Tapestry Skill Builders: Folk Rooster
- • Instructor: Laura Berlage
- • Price: $350
- • Starts: November 10
This course offers great practice for weaving "hills and valleys" and "meet and separate" techniques, as well as keeping your sides nice and straight. It also will push the boundaries of tapestry by integrating embroidery stitches onto the surface of the piece. This project is designed...
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A Mountain Dulcimer Christmas
- • Instructor: Anne Lough
- • Price: $100
- • Date: November 16
“Christmas Time’s A-Comin!” It’s never too early to start working on those Christmas tunes so let’s get going on some holiday favorites. Enjoy learning a variety of classic and timeless celebratory tunes of the season as we focus on right and left hand technique, chord variations...
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"Mountain Dulcimer: Next Level Tricks, Chords, and Skill-building"
- • Instructor: Anne Lough
- • Price: $100
- • Starts: February 17
As you approach new tunes, continue to refine basic techniques and skills on the dulcimer with a focus on strumming and finger placement. Broaden your experience by exploring other tunings and basic chords.
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Continuing Sashiko
- • Instructor: Beth Ross Johnson
- • Price: $167
- • Starts: February 18
Continue your exploration of the folk stitching methods of sashiko. You will start by by learning some new approaches to Hitomezashi stitching including irregular block sizes and using Kuguri to produce wavy designs. Continue exploring the more freehand styles of Moyouzashi by planning...
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"I am Here, Improv Mapping"
- • Instructor: Annie Smith
- • Price: $375
- • Starts: March 4
Capture the memories of a special place by making a map quilt of that place and its surrounds. Choose a map, enlarge it in fabric, add special touches like hand sketched buildings, landscaping, and such. Annie will help you step through the process, making your map a treasured heirloom,...
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