Quirky Workshops Art, Craft and Heritage Skill Courses
Quirky Workshops at Greystoke Craft Garden and Barns is a unique creative venue offering an inspiring range of art, craft and heritage workshops from a C17th listed farmhouse in the pretty village of Greystoke. We're placed 5 miles equidistantly from Penrith, Eden Valley & Ullswater, on the northern fringes of the Lake District, west of Penrith, in beautiful Cumbria, north west England. We have been running around 1440 craft courses each year, since 2005.
During the lockdown of May 2020, we renovated an old hay loft and now host the majority our indoor courses and workshops in this wonderful, new, light, airy and spacious studio - 'the Swallow Barn’ ; although some tutors still prefer the cosy atmosphere and ground floor easy access nature of the original studio, 'Squirrel Barn'. Many of the courses (especially art and calligraphy) feature live streaming of tutor demos onto a large screen at the front, allowing students to watch closely, whilst seated at their desks. This practice was started during Covid but has been continued as very helpful with many workshops.
Please see our website https://www.quirkyworkshops.co.uk/quirky-workshops-cumbria for full details of upcoming courses in date order.
Workshop days are relaxing, friendly and informal. They are delivered by hand picked professional and or expert tutors, many leaders in their chosen fields. Students often travel considerable distances to take part, staying in this lovely village of Greystoke or finding somewhere special close by . . .Keswick, Ullswater, Penrith and the Eden Valley are all within easy driving distance.
One, two or three day courses in:
- stone carving (relief or letter carving), wood carving, bird whittling, spoon carving, willow weaving and rush basket making.
- Lino cut printing, Fused glass, Stained Glass panels and Stained Glass mirrors, Sterling Silver jewellery and Silver Ring making courses, Porcelain plates and vases, and inspiring Mosaics
- Many textile courses including weaving, Needle felting Garden Bird pictures (robin/blue tit/wren) , Herdwick sheep and Pet Portraits, Felt art, Paint Print and Stitch, Felt Slippers, Ecoprinting, Leather Bag making, Learn to Spin and Lampshade Making, 'Hole House' bag making,
- Art courses : Introduction to Pen and Wash , Discovering Watercolours , Botanical and Wildlife illustration, Art courses with John Harrison, Frances Winder, Lyn Evans, Margaret Jarvis, Roy Simmons, Lis Bramwell, Calligraphy with Claire of byMoonandTide (our live streamed onto a large screen is especially useful for this course .. no more struggling to see the tutor demo close up from the back of the group!)
All day courses include tasty homemade lunch, fresh coffees and Aga cream teas. Drinks are served at desks do students may continue working Lunches to be taken at desks or in the garden during summer months.
Our workshop days are popular as gifts for special occasions. Quirky Open Vouchers make perfect and original presents and mean a lovely day can be shared together if preferred. Our Christmas Open vouchers are especially popular.
A full list of our courses can be found at https://www.quirkyworkshops.co.uk/quirky-workshops-cumbria or please phone 017684 83984
We look forward to welcoming you here in Greystoke!
Location
We are in the picturesque village of Greystoke, just 5 miles west of Penrith/Junction 40 of the M6 and a few miles north of the A66 and Ullswater. Keswick is approx 15 minutes further west
Greystoke boasts several B B's, as well as self catering options and has its own website greystokevillage.co.uk We have a playing field, an outdoor heated swimming pool open from June through to August, a Castle, a church, a shop and post office and a cosy pub serving evening meals.
Sterling Silver Jewellery 2 days with Melinda Scarborough
Create your own beautiful jewellery with Sterling Silver, Pearls and Semi-Precious Stones
On this popular 2-day workshop you will use a variety of equipment to make as many stunning pieces as you can under Melinda's guidance. The number of items you make will vary according to your pace. Melinda brings all the tools and equipment essential for any proper silver jewellery course.
Once people become familiar with the tools the designs start flowing. Your design will be unique; you will learn cutting, forming, doming, soldering, texturing and polishing. You can work at your own pace and make the most your workshop time. All photos are student pieces from our Greystoke workshop.
Make a Stained Glass Mirror with Lizzy Hippisley-Cox
Join Lizzy Hippisley-Cox for a one day Stained Glass 'taster' ... Design and make a beautiful Leaded Panel - with optional mirror.
An opportunity to dip your toe into and try this intensive one day Stained Glass taster day with Lizzy making a leaded stained glass mirror (its not compulsory to includ a mirrored panel - using only glass is fine too! All glass, tools, equipment, expertise and enthusiasm is provided by Lizzy, who is highly skilled in preserving these jewels of our heritage and has spent many years advising on and restoring original stained glass windows in our cathedrals and churches countrywide
Lizzy will have some prepared design templates ready for you and there will be a choice of coloured glass along with some pre cut panels mirror as needed. Firstly she will explain the various aspects of creating a stained glass panel, and will then let you have a go at learning the safe glass cutting technique. Once practised, you can then choose your template from a selection supplied, depending on your cutting abilities and at this stage you can decide whether you wish to incorporate a mirrored panel within this or alternatively keep the whole panel as glass. If mirror is required Lizzy can cut this for you.
Once all the pieces are cut , the panel is carefully leading up the mirror according to the design. You will then finish by soldering everything together in your panel and finally cleaning and polishing using demonstrated techniques. You will leave with your own bespoke stained glass (mirrored) panel.
Discovering Stained Glass' ..a two day workshop with Lizzy Hippisley-Cox
Design and create your own beautiful Stained Glass panel on this 2 day workshop with Lizzy Hippisley-Cox of Eden Stained Glass
Working with beautifully coloured and clear, textured glass - all provided by Lizzy - you will learn how to handle, cut safely and to 'lead up' a square panel over the two day course of approximately 8 inches square. Obviously all glass, tools, equipment, expertise and enthusiasm is provided by Lizzy, who is highly skilled in preserving these jewels of our heritage and has spent many years advising on and restoring original stained glass windows in our cathedrals and churches countrywide.
Although traditionally stained glass is associated with place sf worship, these days it is increasingly popular when used in homes for decoration. Staining glass is an ancient art of using colour and light to create atmosphere and to depict images and stories.
The panel you make could be for a place in your house or could be built into a window or frame as a hanging panel. Please bring any ideas you may have in terms of design and Lizzy will assess what will be possible in the time allowed.
Needle Felted Garden Birds ~ 'The Robin' with Helen Hammond (low relief)
Needle Felted Garden Birds, . . 'The Robin' with Helen Hammond (see 'The Wren' and 'The Blue Tit' under a separate heading)
Another exciting and inspiring workshop from Helen Hammond in her needle-felted Birds series .... creating one of our bird tables' most frequent visitors - the 'joyful' Robin!
Join Helen for a lovely day being guided through how to make this beautifully detailed garden friend using the needle felting process. Once again, your piece will have a slightly sculpted low relief appearance, subtly enhancing the natural features of this characterful little bird.
Whatever your ability, Helen will provide you with tools, materials, knowledge and guidance to create your own delightful bird over the day, before applying the legs & fixing it to the 'branch'. The birds will then be mounted in a special box frame, for a really professional finish.
You will be using a variety of natural wool fibres and Helen will teach you all about needle felting and how to blend your fibre colours. You will be using specialist needle felting needles (not sewing needles) for this purpose. These specialist tools/ needles are designed to entangle, compact, control and shape the soft carded wool fibres into firm felted pieces. It is a slow and very therapeutic process.
All reference images will be provided and will form an important part of your working process. This course is suitable for all abilities including beginners. This is a dry felted process and a 'clean' method of working. No aprons or gloves are required. However, please bring plasters!
'Loose Botanicals in Watercolours' with Lyn Evans
Painting a Looser Botanical in Watercolour with Lyn Evans
Lyn likes to paint her watercolours largely from life, choosing blooms which will stay open for a couple of days. She likes interesting shapes so Iris, Lilies and Tulips feature largely in her work. Of course sometimes she uses a photograph, as flowers like peonies have a habit of exploding into life when you least expect it and its better to capture a required image in such cases.
Lyn will teach you how to employ loose watercolour techniques, allowing the pigment and water combination to work their own magic without to much interference being necessary and also using other tools, such as pens, inktence pencils, watercolour pencils, salt and twigs to be used along side your paints can also be used to obtain the beautiful effects from the watercolour.
Please bring - Watercolour paper, (140 lb /300 gsm. or heavier) Watercolours, palette, brushes, black ink (Waterproof if possible), a couple of dip pens, some INKTENCE STICKS if you have some and any flowers, berries etc. or maybe photos of a bunch of flowers.
Below are a selection of Lyn's painting and some of her students.
At the end of the day everyone should have at lease one lovely piece of work to take home. During the morning, Lyn will teach, step by step, the techniques she employs and builds on for different effects - and although some basic experience of watercolours is preferred, it is by no means essential, especially as the painting style is relaxed and loose. Students will need to provide thei own materials as outlined below.
Ceramic Hare Sculptures with Mark Bradley
Sculpt your own beautiful seated Ceramic Hare, with Mark Bradley
New for 2025 we're really pleased to welcome Mark and this exciting ceramic Hare workshop to the Quirky Programme.
Enjoy a busy and absorbing day being guided through the many processes involved in creating these amazing Hares. You can choose whether your Hare is moon gazing with ears back, or positioned up, ears alert listening for danger. Each Hare will be unique, with its own quirks and personality - and towards the end of the class you can choose to create a smoother finish for it, or more textured as in the main photo - or any permutation in between. The choice is yours.
Mark will provide all the equipment and materials needed to create your lovely sculpture in just one day - you only need to bring along shirt or apron to protect your clothes and your materials money below. Once finish the Hares will be carefully transported back to Mark studio to be slowly air dried. After a few weeks they will be ready for bisque firing, and then Mark will apply - if you wish - the various oxides to highlight the ears and tails particularly, before firing a second time.
The colouring is with oxides, students can choose to skip this stage if they wish, and Mark can return them either bisque, or fired twice, which turns the clay into stoneware.
The Hares will hopefully be ready for collection back at Greystoke within 3 to 4 weeks of the class. Sometimes, in damp conditions, this can take take longer.
This course will usually take place in the ground floor Squirrel Barn with three steps up from the gravel driveway.
This class is suitable for every standard of student from beginners upwards. The Hares are frostproof and suitable for the garden.
* NOTE : As fans of 'Pottery Throwdown' know well - putting anything into the hands of the 'kiln gods' is a risk. They're an unpredictable lot, and sometimes things go wrong and carefully sculpted pieces can be damaged with small cracks appearing during the firing process. Or badly wrong even - very occasionally pieces may even explode! If breakages occur, repairs will of course be attempted. Although rare, students should understand this is 'part and parcel' of working with Ceramics and kilns, and there is no guarantee their workshop piece will turn out perfect or in tact.
Dates for this course - see the table below to book:
* Fri 28 November 2025(full) Saturday 29th November 2025 **new** ~ Saturday 7th March ~ Thurs 9th April 2026 ~ Friday 10th April 2026 ~ Friday 10th July 2026 (2026 dates bookable from Nov 3rd '25)
Typically this course runs with around 6-7 students.
Please bring: Please bring your £45 materials money in cash which covers all materials, tutor costs and tutor time, both pre and post workshop. Students also need to bring something to protect their clothes.
Discovering 'Pen & Wash' with Margaret Jarvis
Join Margaret Jarvis for the day and learn the various intricacies of painting in 'Pen and Wash'
This medium is also be known as 'Watercolour & Ink'. This day will touch on colour mixing and using watercolours and it combines the subtle variable nature of the watercolour wash with finer detail picked out in black ink pen, allowing the artist different effects in shading and textures. The type of ink pens used - its water solubility and also stippling intensity and textures employed can create a vast range of effects.
The December workshop will be the same introduction to the day but students can paint their own optyionally themed Christmas subjects such as holly, baubles, snowdrops and christmas trees etc. Matgaret can easily show you how!
Your enquiry will be sent directly to Quirky Workshops Art, Craft and Heritage Skill Courses. Please fill in as much detail as you can.
Quirky Workshops at Greystoke Craft Garden and Barns is a unique creative venue offering an inspiring range of art, craft and heritage workshops from a C17th listed farmhouse in the pretty village of Greystoke. We're placed 5 miles equidistantly from Penrith, Eden Valley & Ullswater, on the northern fringes of the Lake District, west of Penrith, in beautiful Cumbria, north west England. We have been running around 1440 craft courses each year, since 2005.
During the lockdown of May 2020, we renovated an old hay loft and now host the majority our indoor courses and workshops in this wonderful, new, light, airy and spacious studio - 'the Swallow Barn’ ; although some tutors still prefer the cosy atmosphere and ground floor easy access nature of the original studio, 'Squirrel Barn'. Many of the courses (especially art and calligraphy) feature live streaming of tutor demos onto a large screen at the front, allowing students to watch closely, whilst seated at their desks. This practice was started during Covid but has been continued as very helpful with many workshops.
Please see our website https://www.quirkyworkshops.co.uk/quirky-workshops-cumbria for full details of upcoming courses in date order.
Workshop days are relaxing, friendly and informal. They are delivered by hand picked professional and or expert tutors, many leaders in their chosen fields. Students often travel considerable distances to take part, staying in this lovely village of Greystoke or finding somewhere special close by . . .Keswick, Ullswater, Penrith and the Eden Valley are all within easy driving distance.
One, two or three day courses in:
- stone carving (relief or letter carving), wood carving, bird whittling, spoon carving, willow weaving and rush basket making.
- Lino cut printing, Fused glass, Stained Glass panels and Stained Glass mirrors, Sterling Silver jewellery and Silver Ring making courses, Porcelain plates and vases, and inspiring Mosaics
- Many textile courses including weaving, Needle felting Garden Bird pictures (robin/blue tit/wren) , Herdwick sheep and Pet Portraits, Felt art, Paint Print and Stitch, Felt Slippers, Ecoprinting, Leather Bag making, Learn to Spin and Lampshade Making, 'Hole House' bag making,
- Art courses : Introduction to Pen and Wash , Discovering Watercolours , Botanical and Wildlife illustration, Art courses with John Harrison, Frances Winder, Lyn Evans, Margaret Jarvis, Roy Simmons, Lis Bramwell, Calligraphy with Claire of byMoonandTide (our live streamed onto a large screen is especially useful for this course .. no more struggling to see the tutor demo close up from the back of the group!)
All day courses include tasty homemade lunch, fresh coffees and Aga cream teas. Drinks are served at desks do students may continue working Lunches to be taken at desks or in the garden during summer months.
Our workshop days are popular as gifts for special occasions. Quirky Open Vouchers make perfect and original presents and mean a lovely day can be shared together if preferred. Our Christmas Open vouchers are especially popular.
A full list of our courses can be found at https://www.quirkyworkshops.co.uk/quirky-workshops-cumbria or please phone 017684 83984
We look forward to welcoming you here in Greystoke!
Location
We are in the picturesque village of Greystoke, just 5 miles west of Penrith/Junction 40 of the M6 and a few miles north of the A66 and Ullswater. Keswick is approx 15 minutes further west
Greystoke boasts several B B's, as well as self catering options and has its own website greystokevillage.co.uk We have a playing field, an outdoor heated swimming pool open from June through to August, a Castle, a church, a shop and post office and a cosy pub serving evening meals.
Sterling Silver Jewellery 2 days with Melinda Scarborough
Create your own beautiful jewellery with Sterling Silver, Pearls and Semi-Precious Stones
On this popular 2-day workshop you will use a variety of equipment to make as many stunning pieces as you can under Melinda's guidance. The number of items you make will vary according to your pace. Melinda brings all the tools and equipment essential for any proper silver jewellery course.
Once people become familiar with the tools the designs start flowing. Your design will be unique; you will learn cutting, forming, doming, soldering, texturing and polishing. You can work at your own pace and make the most your workshop time. All photos are student pieces from our Greystoke workshop.
Make a Stained Glass Mirror with Lizzy Hippisley-Cox
Join Lizzy Hippisley-Cox for a one day Stained Glass 'taster' ... Design and make a beautiful Leaded Panel - with optional mirror.
An opportunity to dip your toe into and try this intensive one day Stained Glass taster day with Lizzy making a leaded stained glass mirror (its not compulsory to includ a mirrored panel - using only glass is fine too! All glass, tools, equipment, expertise and enthusiasm is provided by Lizzy, who is highly skilled in preserving these jewels of our heritage and has spent many years advising on and restoring original stained glass windows in our cathedrals and churches countrywide
Lizzy will have some prepared design templates ready for you and there will be a choice of coloured glass along with some pre cut panels mirror as needed. Firstly she will explain the various aspects of creating a stained glass panel, and will then let you have a go at learning the safe glass cutting technique. Once practised, you can then choose your template from a selection supplied, depending on your cutting abilities and at this stage you can decide whether you wish to incorporate a mirrored panel within this or alternatively keep the whole panel as glass. If mirror is required Lizzy can cut this for you.
Once all the pieces are cut , the panel is carefully leading up the mirror according to the design. You will then finish by soldering everything together in your panel and finally cleaning and polishing using demonstrated techniques. You will leave with your own bespoke stained glass (mirrored) panel.
Discovering Stained Glass' ..a two day workshop with Lizzy Hippisley-Cox
Design and create your own beautiful Stained Glass panel on this 2 day workshop with Lizzy Hippisley-Cox of Eden Stained Glass
Working with beautifully coloured and clear, textured glass - all provided by Lizzy - you will learn how to handle, cut safely and to 'lead up' a square panel over the two day course of approximately 8 inches square. Obviously all glass, tools, equipment, expertise and enthusiasm is provided by Lizzy, who is highly skilled in preserving these jewels of our heritage and has spent many years advising on and restoring original stained glass windows in our cathedrals and churches countrywide.
Although traditionally stained glass is associated with place sf worship, these days it is increasingly popular when used in homes for decoration. Staining glass is an ancient art of using colour and light to create atmosphere and to depict images and stories.
The panel you make could be for a place in your house or could be built into a window or frame as a hanging panel. Please bring any ideas you may have in terms of design and Lizzy will assess what will be possible in the time allowed.
Needle Felted Garden Birds ~ 'The Robin' with Helen Hammond (low relief)
Needle Felted Garden Birds, . . 'The Robin' with Helen Hammond (see 'The Wren' and 'The Blue Tit' under a separate heading)
Another exciting and inspiring workshop from Helen Hammond in her needle-felted Birds series .... creating one of our bird tables' most frequent visitors - the 'joyful' Robin!
Join Helen for a lovely day being guided through how to make this beautifully detailed garden friend using the needle felting process. Once again, your piece will have a slightly sculpted low relief appearance, subtly enhancing the natural features of this characterful little bird.
Whatever your ability, Helen will provide you with tools, materials, knowledge and guidance to create your own delightful bird over the day, before applying the legs & fixing it to the 'branch'. The birds will then be mounted in a special box frame, for a really professional finish.
You will be using a variety of natural wool fibres and Helen will teach you all about needle felting and how to blend your fibre colours. You will be using specialist needle felting needles (not sewing needles) for this purpose. These specialist tools/ needles are designed to entangle, compact, control and shape the soft carded wool fibres into firm felted pieces. It is a slow and very therapeutic process.
All reference images will be provided and will form an important part of your working process. This course is suitable for all abilities including beginners. This is a dry felted process and a 'clean' method of working. No aprons or gloves are required. However, please bring plasters!
'Loose Botanicals in Watercolours' with Lyn Evans
Painting a Looser Botanical in Watercolour with Lyn Evans
Lyn likes to paint her watercolours largely from life, choosing blooms which will stay open for a couple of days. She likes interesting shapes so Iris, Lilies and Tulips feature largely in her work. Of course sometimes she uses a photograph, as flowers like peonies have a habit of exploding into life when you least expect it and its better to capture a required image in such cases.
Lyn will teach you how to employ loose watercolour techniques, allowing the pigment and water combination to work their own magic without to much interference being necessary and also using other tools, such as pens, inktence pencils, watercolour pencils, salt and twigs to be used along side your paints can also be used to obtain the beautiful effects from the watercolour.
Please bring - Watercolour paper, (140 lb /300 gsm. or heavier) Watercolours, palette, brushes, black ink (Waterproof if possible), a couple of dip pens, some INKTENCE STICKS if you have some and any flowers, berries etc. or maybe photos of a bunch of flowers.
Below are a selection of Lyn's painting and some of her students.
At the end of the day everyone should have at lease one lovely piece of work to take home. During the morning, Lyn will teach, step by step, the techniques she employs and builds on for different effects - and although some basic experience of watercolours is preferred, it is by no means essential, especially as the painting style is relaxed and loose. Students will need to provide thei own materials as outlined below.
Ceramic Hare Sculptures with Mark Bradley
Sculpt your own beautiful seated Ceramic Hare, with Mark Bradley
New for 2025 we're really pleased to welcome Mark and this exciting ceramic Hare workshop to the Quirky Programme.
Enjoy a busy and absorbing day being guided through the many processes involved in creating these amazing Hares. You can choose whether your Hare is moon gazing with ears back, or positioned up, ears alert listening for danger. Each Hare will be unique, with its own quirks and personality - and towards the end of the class you can choose to create a smoother finish for it, or more textured as in the main photo - or any permutation in between. The choice is yours.
Mark will provide all the equipment and materials needed to create your lovely sculpture in just one day - you only need to bring along shirt or apron to protect your clothes and your materials money below. Once finish the Hares will be carefully transported back to Mark studio to be slowly air dried. After a few weeks they will be ready for bisque firing, and then Mark will apply - if you wish - the various oxides to highlight the ears and tails particularly, before firing a second time.
The colouring is with oxides, students can choose to skip this stage if they wish, and Mark can return them either bisque, or fired twice, which turns the clay into stoneware.
The Hares will hopefully be ready for collection back at Greystoke within 3 to 4 weeks of the class. Sometimes, in damp conditions, this can take take longer.
This course will usually take place in the ground floor Squirrel Barn with three steps up from the gravel driveway.
This class is suitable for every standard of student from beginners upwards. The Hares are frostproof and suitable for the garden.
* NOTE : As fans of 'Pottery Throwdown' know well - putting anything into the hands of the 'kiln gods' is a risk. They're an unpredictable lot, and sometimes things go wrong and carefully sculpted pieces can be damaged with small cracks appearing during the firing process. Or badly wrong even - very occasionally pieces may even explode! If breakages occur, repairs will of course be attempted. Although rare, students should understand this is 'part and parcel' of working with Ceramics and kilns, and there is no guarantee their workshop piece will turn out perfect or in tact.
Dates for this course - see the table below to book:
* Fri 28 November 2025(full) Saturday 29th November 2025 **new** ~ Saturday 7th March ~ Thurs 9th April 2026 ~ Friday 10th April 2026 ~ Friday 10th July 2026 (2026 dates bookable from Nov 3rd '25)
Typically this course runs with around 6-7 students.
Please bring: Please bring your £45 materials money in cash which covers all materials, tutor costs and tutor time, both pre and post workshop. Students also need to bring something to protect their clothes.
Discovering 'Pen & Wash' with Margaret Jarvis
Join Margaret Jarvis for the day and learn the various intricacies of painting in 'Pen and Wash'
This medium is also be known as 'Watercolour & Ink'. This day will touch on colour mixing and using watercolours and it combines the subtle variable nature of the watercolour wash with finer detail picked out in black ink pen, allowing the artist different effects in shading and textures. The type of ink pens used - its water solubility and also stippling intensity and textures employed can create a vast range of effects.
The December workshop will be the same introduction to the day but students can paint their own optyionally themed Christmas subjects such as holly, baubles, snowdrops and christmas trees etc. Matgaret can easily show you how!
Your enquiry will be sent directly to Quirky Workshops Art, Craft and Heritage Skill Courses. Please fill in as much detail as you can.