Children from local primary schools were invited to Anne Hathaway's Cottage and to Shakespeare's New Place to get in the festive spirit (a little earlier than usual!) and create a series of wonderful decorations for Shakespeare's family homes.
Children aged between 4 and 11 from Shottery St Andrew’s Primary School learnt about Christmas in Tudor and Victorian times and drew comparisons to how Christmas is celebrated today. They made fruit jewel decorations, decoupage stars, corsages to add to garlands and beautiful tealight holders from glass jars, tissue paper and a silhouette of Anne Hathaway's Cottage. The tealight holders were particularly effective. The children really enjoyed turning off the classroom lights and seeing their cottage come to life! All of the decorations are now on display at the cottage and Shottery St Andrew’s even have their own Christmas tree in our visitor reception area.
Year 5 at St Gregory’s Catholic Primary School worked with textile artist, Mary from Crazy Mary Crafts, to create a stunning advent calendar for New Place. The children all chose one of Shakespeare’s characters. The majority of plays were represented and we had a very bright and colourful representation of Feste and a rather terrifying Caliban! Everyone was incredibly impressed with the children’s sewing skills. Mary taught them running stitch, how to create a beautiful weave effect through the stitching and how to attach a sequin. The children all decorated their numbers beautifully and the very talented Mary brought everything together at the end to form the wonderful calendar. The advent calendar is on display in the upstairs exhibition room at Shakespeare's New Place.
We hope to welcome many of the young artists and their families to Anne Hathaway’s Cottage and New Place over the Christmas period to admire their handiwork - come and join them!