Rupert Bozeat at work (photo: Michelle Shakesby).

Celebrating wood at Alexandra Park greenhouse in March

A weekend dedicated to wood will be held by the Alexandra Park Greenhouse Group in late March, with a wood market on Saturday 22 March followed by a wood carving workshop on the Sunday. Lynda Foy explains what lies in store.

The wood-themed weekend, celebrating the sustainability of this renewable resource, was timed to follow hard on the heels of World Wood Day, which falls on Friday 21 March.

Visitors to the community hub based at Alexandra Park greenhouse can create a new hobby for themselves by attending the Wood Carving Workshop which runs from 9.30am to 5.30pm on Sunday 23rd.  The event will be led by Rupert Bozeat, a retired senior lecturer and course leader in furniture and product design.

Carving skills: a wooden tool takes shape (photo: Michelle Shakesby).

He will be showing beginners how to carve soft, recently felled hardwood into items such as spoons or spatulas. Course members will also learn how to cleave a log, make billets – pieces of wood  – with a carving axe, and then fashion wooden utensils from them.

The Wood Market will be held on Saturday 22nd, from 10am to 3pm, when a variety of stalls will be offering demonstrations and goods for sale.

Rupert Bozeat will be selling greenwood carved bowls and spoons, plus showing how to make them. The market will also feature a demonstration of brush-making.

Members of the Hastings and St Leonards Mens Shed, based at Ore, will partner up with the greenhouse for this event to display their work, connect with the community and highlight the importance of staying active and creative.

Also with a stall at the market will be the Sussex trug industry, which is listed by the Hastings Crafts Association as being “critically endangered” – the final stage before extinction. Trugs are shallow baskets made of wood  or wickerwork used to carry smaller garden implements.

From April, the industry will be under the umbrella of the Sussex Trug Heritage Centre, a not-for-profit organisation that has been set up to preserve the craft in future. The greenhouse group is creating a partnership with the heritage centre and will continue to promote it after the wood market.

The greenhouse, off St Helens Road, will re-open to the public on Saturday 1 March.

Winter opening hours will be: Saturdays, 10.30am to 1pm, and Thursdays, 2 to 4pm. Plants can be donated or bought from volunteers.

A Seed Swap Day will be held on Saturday 8 March, when the public can bring split plants or unwanted seeds to the site. See the greenhouse website.

Booking is essential for the Wood Carving Workshop. Tickets cost £60, plus a £5.71 booking fee, from Eventbrite. 

The greenhouse can be hired for meetings, exhibitions, children’s activities and workshops. For more details contact: social@our-greenhouse.org.

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