Do you have a stationery fetish and love learning to make and decorate new and practical things in a short space of time? Then attend one of Dailylike's Craft Calendar Workshops held around Australia.
A general spring clean of cupboard drawers are usually on my 'must do' list during January holiday breaks. The tell-tale sign is usually when they are jammed with clutter of stationery that have fallen to the back of the drawers. As I cleaned out my drawers, I collected bags full of stationery all crammed in my drawers over the year, enough supplies to service a classroom for an entire school year. I'm a stationery addict, which admittedly I don't really get as I should be using less stationery not more in a modern digital world. Why is this? Perhaps it's the recognition that stationery usage has eroded steadily over the years with the rise of digital communication, and clinging onto stationery bits and pieces was my way of ensuring old practices do not dwindle to the point of extinction. That said, I still prefer to see tangible calendars pinned up somewhere on a wall than on my iPhone. I feel as though it's a guaranteed path towards being organised for the year.
Combine a stationery addiction, with the love of learning to make something new and practical, and you should attend one of Dailylike's workshops. I attended with my teenage cousin the Craft Calendar workshop run by the distributor duo of Dailylike Australia, Sarah and Amy in Sydney last Saturday morning.
Why you should go
I particularly liked two aspects about this workshop: firstly, the skills you learn from making and decorating calendars in this two hour workshop can be applied to refresh the look of other everyday practical items and give it new life such as cards, invitations, notebooks, water bottles; secondly, because you predominantly are working with sticky beautifully designed fabric paper, glue becomes unnecessary, therefore, avoiding all the messiness involved in waiting for fabric or paper to dry.
Location
The workshop was held at Work-Shop Makery on Oxford Street, in Darlinghurst, conveniently located only a 10 minutes' walk from Museum Station. Work-Shop Makery is a creative pop up space where the Dailylike Sydney workshops were held, a space also shared with a unique tea leaves local business, which all workshop participants benefited from being able to sample fragrant tea and yummy scones during our workshop.
Dailylike Workshops held in Darlinghurst in Sydney
As you walk into the store, you immediately notice the workshop tables set up with trays of pretty and coloured stationery of fabric sticky paper and tape, with a wonderful variety of surface designs, pencils, pens, rulers and even a decorated water bottle. Lined across the room is a pre-made calendar sample with a different fabric design for each month, so that workshop participants know from the start of the workshop what the final product should look like.
Dailylike workshop space
Our workspace had good lighting, was air-conditioned, and spacious; and our instructors Amy and Sarah, were friendly, clear in their guidance, helpful and hands on, all of which were conducive to ensuring a relaxed, creative and collaborative atmosphere for learning.
What did we do?
As a first step we were provided with pre-printed calendars with blank space above the days of each calendar month. Our job was to come up with designs to fill in the blank spaces for each month using the Dailylike fabric material on the table. If we had mental blanks to start with then you could use the templates provided. The templates we used include ice cream cones, pineapples, leaves, flowers, heart shapes, strawberries, thunder clouds, and paper airplanes.
Knowing this was our first time decorating calendars, our instructors wisely advised us to start with January knowing there were only a few days left in January and if we stuffed up then that month could be discarded – good idea to practice on January as you wouldn't want to stuff up February or the rest of the year.
We traced the templates onto the back of the fabric paper and then cut them out. Some spacial awareness was necessary as when you peel the backing from the sticky fabrics, the picture shape appears in the reverse side when you stick it down. Obvious, but I slipped up on this when I started to get the gist of it and decided to come up with my own music note templates.
As there were 12 months to complete and we were striving to make each month look perfect, at best most of us completed 6 months. A tip for participants is to come up with your template designs first for all 12 months and then cut them out so that you can just stick the fabric at home to complete the calendar.
Each workshop participant also gets a Dailylike goodies bag with fabric paper and tape samples.
The final product
If you want to try one of Dailylike hands on craft workshops then check out their website for details on when their next workshop is on.
Overall
In addition to appreciating the fine art of making your own calendar designs with beautiful Dailylike sticky fabric paper, the two hour workshop was also a fun way to socialise with family and friends. I recall a saying from The Blue Man Group show performances that has resonated with:
"If you would like to establish a connection with people from another culture, it's always good to offer a few gifts as a gesture of friendship. But, an even better way to forge a lasting bond is by creating something together. Whether it's a meal, an art project or a spontaneous dance party, when you create with others, you create a connection that lasts a lifetime."
Take a friend or family member and give Dailylike craft workshops a go...you'll have fun.