About Us
Learn & Create is an organisation which aims to help our local community to learn, develop and share creative skills. We are currently a small limited company with social enterprise aims - we hope to become a Community Interest Company.
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What's a social enterprise? It's a business with social objectives - they have a clear mission and their actions and profits go towards achieving that mission
Our Mission
To make creative activities accessible to all by providing:
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Affordable courses and workshops
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Access to equipment and creative workspace
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Events and activities allowing the community to come together and enjoy creativity
Craft hobbies can be expensive, can require a great deal of space and can be tricky to get started. We aim to tackle all of those problems, so that anyone can try a new craft!
Our Story
Our founder, Lexy has been crafting since the age of 10 - starting with cross stitch and learning to use a sewing machine, teaching herself to knit at the age of 17 and moving on to quilting, embroidery, bag and dressmaking. Whether is working with fabric or yarn - Lexy will give it a go!
Being self-taught allows you to really explore different methods of crafting and to seek out multiple techniques and ideas to find one that works for you. And Lexy now uses this approach with teaching - helping students to understand the different techniques but to also look at alternatives and decide which works best for them.
Lexy has been involved in Girlguiding since the age of 7 and now runs Kingussie Rainbows and Guides - so teaching young people crafty skills is a huge part of our meetings! Working with a local charity in Kingussie, Lexy was given the first opportunity to teach knitting to adults and after the pandemic - when that organisation closed - it just seemed a natural progression to keep going! We started small running social groups and kids classes in local community halls.
In 2022 we opened our first venue in Kingussie - a space where the community can come to learn new crafts, try out different equipment & enjoy creativity! We were incredibly lucky to receive support from the Kingussie Hydro Fund which allowed up to buy a range of sewing machines and overlockers. Here we developed some great beginners courses including Sewing Kids Clothes, Granny Squares and Overlockers for Beginners - as well as our first Young Creative courses. We also hosted our first social groups, inviting the local community to enjoy our space for creative activities.
In June 2023 we were delighted to move to a bigger premise in Newtonmore - giving us the opportunity to not only have more room for courses and socials, but also to expand into retail! We are working with local crafters to provide them with space to sell their handmade products and we are also starting to provide a range of haberdashery and locally produced hand dyed yarn. Our new shop also now features a great Cosy Corner - ideal for our social craft groups or just enjoying a cup of tea and a chat! There is also plenty of adjustable workspaces for all types of crafting allowing us to increase our class sizes. We're really excited to be a part of Newtonmore's High Street!
