C.W.I. Display Of Arts And Crafts At Fair

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30212, 17 August 1963, Page 2

C.W.I. Display Of Arts And Crafts At Fair

Pine needles, apple pips and broken egg-shells might seem unlikely materials to use in art and craft work; but not to members of art and craft circles of Country Women’s Institutes in Canterbury. They have used all these, and a lot of other materials, in a varied display of work in their bay at the Industries Fair.

Most institutes from the Canterbury Federation have supplied articles for the exhibition and during the two weeks of the fair demonstrations on how to make many of the articles will be given.

A committee of six women, convened by Mrs A. R. Gould, of South Brighton, organised the display and spent moat of yesterday arranging exhibits in readiness for the opening of the fair last evening. Helping with lastminute details was Mrs L. M. Kellaway, president of the federation.

In the main body of Canterbury Court there were busy sounds yesterday as final preopening adjustments were made to stalls.

In the C.W.I. bay. preparations were just as intense, but they centred on such topics as the best way of displaying an Afghan crocheted rug to best advantage, where the

series of little peg dolls, brightly dressed in national costumes, should go, and the placing of a piece of embroidery or an egg-shell work lamp stand. Apple pips were quite unidentifiable strung and varnished to form a necklace, and gummed on mounts to make matching ear-rings. Coffee beans alone, and strung with tiny shells, had also been used to make most unusual •jewellery.” Pine needles formed the sides of two small trays. They were tightly bound in groups with raffia and varnished, and the effect was novel and attractive. Flax, dried and stripped, and knotted and

bound with raffia, made a work box and a wastepaper basket. Women manning the bays will explain how rope mats and animals, embroidery (including bdnea work), acetate work, and crushed egg-shell decorations, are done. Special demonstrations had been arranged of spinning, cake-icing, floral art, sweetmaking, and Christmas novelties, said Mrs Gould. The growth of interest in arts and crafts had been rapid in recent years, she said. Three years ago, the federation formed a conveners’ circle, to which the leaders of arts and crafts circles from various institutes went regularly to see demonstrations of some craft. They then took the new skill back to their own circles. At another bay, organised by the W.E.A., demonstrations of pottery-making on a potter’s wheel will be given while the fair is in progress. A selection of pieces made by members of the pottery classes of the W.E.A. is on show at the stand, which is in the arts and crafts centre.