Castanea - Spain April 11 - 15 Part 1 of 5

 This is going to be a mammoth blog so do keep checking back -
I will be posting more over the next few days.

one of the beautiful trees in the garden
I may have mentioned once or twice . . . how much I was looking forward to teaching in Spain last week - well it was even better than I could have hoped. We had fabulous weather, great students who all got on very well with each other and the food - Oh!! I have put on 1.5 kilos!!!!!!! Oh! and the students produced some fabulous work as well . . . but more of that tomorrow. The villa and two studios are set in luscious gardens in the village of Venta De Los Pinos, Canadas de San Pedro, just 18 kilometres from the ancient city Murcia
There were 2 courses running, 'Beads Amore' with Jane Sadgrove and 'Extreme Surfaces to stitch - or not' with myself. Jane Sadgove has a beautiful shop in Sevenoaks called Beads Amore and runs workshops from there 4 times a week, www.beadsamore.co.uk

Jane Bolsover and one of her wonderful lunches

We were looked after during the week by the very capable Jane Bolsover. Jane was kept very busy organising all the collections from various airports, transport to and from the Hotel to the studios during the week, cooking our fantastic lunches and accompanying us on the Murcia trip - Phew, I feel exhausted just listing what she did. Jane made everything very easy for us during the week, nothing was too much trouble - we were quite spoilt!

Sunday 10th
After setting up our studios, Jane Sagrove and I met the students at their hotel in San Pedro del Pinatar in the evening, it was chance for us both to meet our students and give them some idea of what we would be doing during the week. It was very civilised sitting on the terrace of the hotel with a glass of wine overlooking the beach - Sigh! I wish I was there now.

colourful striped trousers blowing about in the warm breeze in the market

Monday 11th
9.30 saw us all meeting up to have a coffee and a wander through the market in San Pedro. It is an enormous market with hundreds of stalls but reasonably easy to navigate as it is organised into sections such as fruit and veg, textiles, finished clothes and household goods, jewellery . . . you get the idea. Going to the market on the first morning gives everyone a chance to relax and get a feel of the area and hopefully get inspired by the wonderful shapes, colours and light.

Jane Sadgrove was the first to discover the amazing button stall

more buttons

An occasional member of the Castnaea team also accompanied us to the market to make sure everything ran smoothly and to translate if necessary. Diego lives locally and helps out when we need him, from translating and air port transfers to general entertainment. He is great fun and very helpful.

Diego assisting Marion and Lee in their purchases on a jewellery stall

 
 one of the many fabric stalls, I succumbed to the piece of turquoise and bronze embroidered cotton organdie

wonderful colour combinations abounded

Jane B came to collect the students and take them back to the studios at 12.30 and Diego took Jane S and I back. Castanea usually use coaches to ferry students about during the week but as we had a smaller group this time Jane B had the extra duty of ferrying everyone about.
We all had lunch together and then it was in to the studios to start work - I will write about that tomorrow.

from the left, Jill, Jill, Pauline, Jane Sadgrove, Marion and Lee

 . . . and that was just the first day . . .

 x

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