Activities Beyond the Workshop Spaces: Movement, Walks, Presentations, Discussions & Evening Community Events!
These offerings will all be offered free of charge and many require your participation! Please browse and read through these offerings so you know what to bring to participate.
If you have something to offer please email us and we will see if it’s a good fit. info@vonhandfestival.com
More to come!
Yoga
Daily
Begin your day with morning Yoga. The class will take place outside before breakfast each morning around 7:15/7:30. Bring your own mat, blanket, or towel to move on.
Morning yoga will help us wake up softly, to feel good in our bodies and to get prepared to learn and craft.
Movements will be adapted to the participants and will not require a yoga mat (you can of course bring one) but a towel or blanket on the grass will be all you need.
Louise teaches a variety of yoga but has an extra passion for guided meditation and fun non-performative yoga.
Louise’s offerings will be in English and Swedish.
Children’s Program
w/ Filipp Rust
Daily
We are thrilled to offer a Children’s program this year led by Filipp Rust, a kindergarten teacher and nature and wilderness educator. During the von Hand Festival, Filipp will accompany the children throughout the week and create a varied program for them. Together they will explore nature, experience exciting adventures, and learn about the environment through play. “My goal is to give the children a truly enjoyable time in nature and with each other, and to strengthen their connection to nature. My own children will also be there. I look forward to seeing you.” - Filipp
Telling the wood from the Trees
On Wednesday Evening
Have you ever wondered which wood to use?
Michail will talk about:
the past uses of a variety of our native trees,
the current availability of different species
old friends and newcomers
the changes in the woodlands around us
the suitability of different types of tree for different projects
based on over 35 years of experience in using a wide range of locally grown wood.
Presented on Wednesday Evening
Fairytales for Children of all Ages
by Jens Hinghaus
Several evenings
Jens will share fairytales with us by the fireside—or in another quiet spot—just before bedtime for our younger listeners. The stories come from across Europe and are suitable for children of all ages, as well as those who consider themselves grown-ups. Since most younger children don’t understand English, the tales will be told in German. English translations are available on request.
Shrink pot Lid Making Demo
Time TBD
Unfortunately, shrinkpots always have to dry for a few weeks before it makes sense to make a lid. And I'm always asked in the workshops how to make them. Well, maybe this demo is just the right thing. I bring shrinkpots that need a lid and I show you how I do it, which steps I follow, which tools I use, where dangers lurk, what I have to watch out for, what can go wrong, something is bound to go wrong, as always when you demonstrate something. But no matter, we all learn from it. In the end, you've seen how it can work. You can ask any questions that interest you.
Circle Songs
Hosted by Gwendolin Altenhöfer
An evening or two during the festival (and as wanted =)
You are invited to join us in singing simple, earth and nature-connected songs and rounds from different parts of the world. Many are chants or circle songs, that are easy to learn and unfold their power through repetition. The songs are mostly in german or in english, some in other languages.
Just come along and enjoy a relaxed evening in a circle around the fire! You don’t need any musical qualification: if you can speak, you can sing as well :-)
Trade Blanket
Hosted by Oliver Klotzek
Tuesday Evening
Join us for the first Von Hand Trade Blanket! An evening affair that all are welcome to participate in.
What is the Trade Blanket & How does it work?
Bring items made by hand (or other items related to craft, outdoor skills, etc.) to trade on the trade blanket.
Following dinner on Tuesday evening Oliver will set up a blanket where those who wish to offer something for trade will gather around. One by one an item will be presented and everyone else will have the opportunity to silently present their offer for trade. The presenter of their item will either select or respectfully decline to trade and then the next person goes. It’s a bit challenging to describe in writing so you will have to experience it.
(Examples of what we (Raleigh & Oliver) might be bringing to potentially trade: Handmade brooms, hand carved spoons, hand made earrings, Swedish woven baskets, dried elderberries from our garden, bottle of fire cider, tools we no longer need, salted sheep skin, homemade salve, homemade chocolate truffles, etc….)
The trade blanket thrives best when the community brings a wide variety of trade items. You never know what someone might want to trade for. No trade is too small. Side trades off the blanket are welcome.
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Inspired by the Trade Blanket at Buckeye Gathering in California which also comes through the lineage of other gatherings, and the centuries olf history of trading wares spread out on a wool blanket across Turtle Island (the United States). We will do our best to honor the event here at Von Hand.
Treetime: Stories, Myth, & Legend of Trees and Timber
Michail Schütte, tree-lover and green woodworker, leads a walk through the woods:
-Telling of the history of trees as the Earth’s largest living beings and how mankind depends on them;
-Speaking not only of myth and legend surrounding trees but also of the traditional uses of woodland and timber;
-Touching on what the future may hold for the relationship of man and tree.
Approx 3 hours.
Held on two occasions in the second half of the week.
An Afternoon or two
Discussion: Ancestral Threads: Craft, Skill & Belonging
During Von Hand, we’ll gather for an open conversation with some of our instructors and all who wish to take part. Together, we’ll explore the significance of handcraft, ancestral arts, land-based skills, and nature connection practices — not only as things we do, but as ways of building relationship, resilience, and meaning.
While strong communities and gatherings exist in each of these fields, they are often separate. We believe there is a growing need to bring these worlds into closer dialogue: to consider what we might learn from each other, how our work overlaps, and how these skills can help us meet the challenges of our time.
This will be a space to reflect on questions such as:
How do these practices shape our relationship to the land?
What does it mean to be in right relationship with place through craft?
How can we root our work in care for future generations?
What role do these skills play in creating community and belonging?
How do we carry these traditions forward without losing their heart?
We hope to spark meaningful exchange, strengthen connections across traditions, and imagine together how we might carry these skills forward in service of land, community, and culture.
Thursday Evening - (Subject to change time)
Lathe Camp
Pieterjan has generously offered to bring his 6 lathes in addition to the other 16 we will have on site to set up a lathe camp where folks can turn without a workshop being held.
This space will not have instruction for turning. If you have experience you are welcome to use the lathes, and without experience you will have to seek support from those around that are available and excited to share.
The other Von Hand lathes will also be available when courses aren’t running.
We ask for a 5-10€ donation towards the use of tools, the lathes and wood per day. Other forms of trade are also welcome!
All week
Slöjd Swap
How it Works:
There will be a large box where you are invited to wrap up and put in a handmade item that YOU have made and then in return you take out another offering. It is a blind and annonymous swap of craft. Last time we had wooden wares, pottery/ceramics, hand bound notebooks, scarves, natural pigments, brooms, hand spun wool, prints, etc going through the swap. It’s an adventure of exchange. All entries are welcome to enter, tho we do encourage folks to put in something you are proud of and would be thrilled to receive.
You are more than welcome to contribute several items and receive just as many. If one goes in for every one out it works perfectly.
This will be running all week and you engage with it whenever you wish. You could put in one or a few items at the beginning of the week and take out your swaps at the end of the week or any day in between.
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The Slöjd Swap is a concept inspired and borrowed from Jeppe at Slöjdfest Norway.
It was a great success in 2023 at the last gathering of Von Hand.
All week
Scholarship Raffle
Friday Evening
During the festival we will host a raffle (lottery) with all raised funds going towards the following year’s scholarships.
To help us reach that goal we hope you will bring some of your own handmade wares to contribute to the raffle. We have also received some outside donations towards the raffle such as carving tools and books!
How it works:
Over the week we will collect your Prize donations (things you have made by hand, tools, quality materials, craft books, etc.)
All prizes will be on display to browse over the week
Raffle/Lottery Ticket sales will take place in the second half of the week
Friday Evening we will make an event of presenting each prize and drawing the winners.
In 2023 we raised 1500€ and have been able to offer a ticket and food for 5 people and a weeks worth of workshops for this year.
As this was our first year offering scholarships we asked the community to nominate those they felt were in most need of the scholarships. We hope that each year we can offer a few full covered scholarships.
Community Market
by All of you!
Thursday Evening
Bring your handmade pieces and wares to show, trade and sell with everyone else. This will be our final event of the festival!
Community Market will be held in conjunction with the Tool Flea Market on Thursday Evening.
If there is enough interest/demand we will have a second community market on Saturday after closing circle.
Tool Flea Market & Seed Exchange
Bring your old or unused tools to barter, trade or sell!
This was very successful last year so we are excited to offer it again.
The Tool Flea Market will be held in conjunction with a Seed Exchange and the Community Market on Thursday Evening.