Fund-A-Need Program
What Do You Support at the Folk School?
Our Fund-A-Need list represents a wide variety of necessities, from painting easels to woodcarving workbenches and from cooking studio shelving to weaving studio looms. As you know, our studios are where much of the magic happens: learning from your instructor, connecting with your classmates, and tapping into your own creative mindset.
Upcoming Class Collection
Travel the World in Brasstown
Travel the world via a Folk School learning vacation. Explore the crafts, food, and music of diverse cultures during a weeklong or weekend class. Enjoy these upcoming class picks that provide a window to the world – and you won't even need a passport. ...
RECENT STORIES
Talking Old Time with Riley Baugus, Banjo Instructor
Have you always wanted to try clawhammer banjo? In September, we have an exciting opportunity for beginners to study for a week with Riley Baugus. Riley usually teaches more advanced and intermediate classes, so don’t miss this chance to start your banjo journey off with one of the most sought-after teachers in the world! He will return to teach Beginning Southern Clawhammer Banjo, September 8–14, 2019. In the meantime, enjoy our interview!CP: How was your class earlier this year at the Folk School?
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Fund-A-Need: What’s Important to You?
If you’ve been to the Folk School, you know how seriously we take our student comment forms. We ask every student and instructor in every class – that’s about 6,900 people per year – to tell us what would make their Folk School experience even better. And we read every single one.
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The Folk School Cookbook
Paper Thread Sculptural Basketry with Aimee Lee
If you are interested in basketry, paper art, or weaving, and want to learn new techniques, materials, and form, don’t miss our upcoming class with Aimee Lee, Paper Thread through Asia, scheduled for June 9–15, 2019. You will discover ancient techniques of transforming paper into thread, cord, small weavings, and sculptural basketry. Based on Korean and Japanese traditions of jiseung (paper basketry) and shifu (paper cloth), you will learn to spin one-ply thread and twist two-ply cord in completely different ways.
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Thank You for a Wonderful Friends & Family Day
A volunteer in the Quilting Studio holds samples of the studio project: Mug mats!
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A Spring Tradition at the Folk School: Dancing around the Maypole
When winter fades and the trees and shrubs burst into glorious bloom, the Folk School tractor lumbers out of the shed and is given a circular turn to mow around the Maypole field. For the last dozen years or more it’s been Jan or John Clarke who climbs to the top of the twenty-foot pole and wedges there a wooden ring holding many pairs of colorful ribbons. As he lets each ribbon drop to the ground, the inevitable wind tangles them up faster than we can put them in the hands of eager children and “grown-ups,” ready to weave them around the pole to the sound of the fiddle, accordion, and banjo.
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White Coconut Cake with Lemon Curd Filling
This lovely cake is perfect for Easter, May Day, or Mother’s Day, a wedding or baby shower or a spring birthday. It’s both beautiful and scrumptious and tastes like the very epitome of spring. If, for no other reason, you want to simply make it to mark the season, share it proudly and lovingly with friends and family.
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Traces of Beauty: Rust Printing with Lauren Koch
Expand your ideas about printmaking with found objects in a new weekend class taught by artist Lauren Koch: Traces of Beauty: Rust Printing. Rust printing is a unique way of mark making that utilizes steel and iron to create images on paper and cloth. I recently talked to Lauren about her work, rust printing, and her relationship with the Folk School. Enjoy our interview!
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Upcoming Classes Celebrate Irish Music & Dance
Do you love the sounds of Irish music? Do you dream of playing a reel or dancing a jig? We have some great upcoming classes to immerse you in the spirit of Ireland! Gain confidence to join in the fun of traditional Irish music and dance in your community and abroad.
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Expectations
It is Thursday afternoon. Outside the writing studio window, the day is bathed in sunlight, the limb patterns on the grass motionless. Inside the studio, writers are at work with pen or laptop, or staring out the window, or sitting chin in hand. Chairs squeak, the printer clacks, the clock ticks. Small sounds that only accentuate the silence. The writing group is focused, which is different from a focus group . . . or maybe it isn’t.
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Rags to Riches with JoEl Levy LoGiudice
Rag rug weaving embraces the folk art tradition of using everyday, readily available materials to build aesthetically beautiful, yet functional art: textiles made from the things we have, can forage, or acquire. With the craze du jour surrounding KonMari, now is a good time to think about new options for all those clothes you may be putting into the “Thank you, goodbye” pile. Rag rug weaving might be your perfect option!
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March of the Fiddlers
When students show up at an Intermediate-level fiddle class, they already know how to play some tunes — maybe some fast ones, maybe some waltzes; tunes learned from a friend or teacher or family member, tunes laboriously acquired from a scratchy old recording, or tunes read out of a tunebook.
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Documentary Storytelling: New Class by Local Photographer
These images were made during my time working as a Sales Associate in the Folk School Craft Shop. The series began as a way to recognize the work study students and hosts who come and go from the Folk School so quickly, yet are a vital part of what we do. I was curious about their lives, before and after the Folk School.
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Studio Batik with Jessica Kaufman
Have you ever wanted to try batik and hand-dyeing? We have a very special surface design class coming up on April 7–13, 2019 with Jessica Kaufman: Studio Batik: Many Techniques, Amazing Results. Jessica has studied batik methods from Indonesia and India and is the owner of WAXON Batik & Dye Studio in Asheville, NC. With over 16 years of teaching experience and an MA in crafts education, Jessica has taught batik and tie-dye to summer campers, school children, high schoolers, and adults all over the country. We are lucky to have her for a week-long intensive focusing on this gorgeous and functional art form. Enjoy our interview!
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Antipasto Salad
Today we’re sharing the perfect recipe for holiday potlucks. Antipasto Salad is easy to assemble and makes an impressive addition to any table.
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