The Apple Creek Farm

Recently I met with Wynne with the Friends of the Limerick School organization. She is heading up a community arts program at the Limerick School, a historic one room school house located in Akron, NY.

History of Limerick School

The school has been in operation since the early 1800s (10 years before the founding of the city of Buffalo!), and the current building built in the mid-1800s replaced an even older building that was lost to a fire. The school was in operation from its onset until 1957, and they have some great photos of some alumni visiting the building on the website.

Since 1957 they’ve focused on hosting community events for all ages, including Girl Scouts, 4-H, and even senior groups.

Recently they finished renovations to get the building back up to code, and it’s looking wonderful while still maintaining it’s wonderful one room school house architecture.

Fiber Arts at Limerick School

Recently Wynne put out a call for teachers of the arts to come and teach there with the help of some grants they were eligible for. I met with her recently and learned that she would love to see fiber arts be part of the workshops they offer for the community.

We are getting set up to offer a Beginning Yarn Spinning class where we will be learning how to spin with a drop spindle and ply so students can take home a usable skein of they very own yarn. I’ll be sourcing the wool for that even from one of my fiber farm friends – I have a growing number of local wool providers – which is such an amazing thing! We are so fortunate here in WNY with lots of fiber farmers, wool dyers, and even wood tool makers like myself!

She also already has a set of small student looms – which is just so perfect! So we will also be offering a Beginning Weaving Workshop. It’s open to everyone, but weaving is a great way to use handspun yarn for those who take the Beginning Yarn Spinning class before hand.

Details and sign up info for those will be available soon!

Further Opportunities

I’m also excited to be able to use this space for other fiber workshops and activities in the future as well. I’ve offered some classes at a nice venue in the south towns, but it was a bit too far from the city for some of the people interested. I’m excited how central this is to WNY and that the values of the organization behind the venue align so well with my own views on community education in the arts.

Here’s more teaching opportunities in the new year!

Happy Spinning (and learning!)
Ann

Photos are from the Friends of Limerick School website.