Shedding open day coming your way

The Shedding Community Workshop has been running in Mullumbimby since May 2018 and has seen over 300 students pass through its workshops.

Now you have a chance to go and see what all the excitement is about at their free open day that is running on Sunday, February 2, 10am till 3pm. The open day will include a range of workshops, demonstrations, information stalls, food, drink and music.

‘The whole point of community shedding is about making it accessible to all people regardless of their genders, age or financial backgrounds,’ said Sophie Wilksch, who founded the Mullumbimby Community Shedding workshop space.

‘The open day is about sharing skills, knowledge, and information between people as well as between the organisations involved in supporting it. The community shedding workshops are about carpentry, building and everything between,’ explains Sophie.

‘It is not just about how to use tools it is also about how to overcome challenges and obstacles and people take that back into the world with them. They learn how to say, “here’s a problem, how can we work through this?”.’

Sophie also highlights that the workshops are about social connection in a world where many people feel isolated and are seeking community.

‘It crosses culture, gender and generational spaces,’ she said. ‘We might have an 18 year-old working with a 74 year-old and the 18 year-old might say they are non-binary and the 74 year-old  might ask “what’s that?”. So it is a way to create connections and learning between people.’

To join the workshop you firstly participate in a three hour ‘UpSkill’ workshop. The UpSkill workshop was originally sponsored by Byron Shire Council, and now runs by donation every Friday morning, followed by a casual afternoon skill-sharing workshop – Tools ‘n Tinker .

A range of of carpentry and building courses are available from pay by donation, government funded VET courses and full cost courses to ensure that everyone has access.