News

Our final project event will be taking place at Birmingham City University on March 23rd. At the event we will reflect on the impact of the project and talk about what more needs to be done to make the craft sector more inclusive. The event will also include a launch of the ‘Craft Economies and … Read More “Final project event taking place March 23rd 2023” »

This year Birmingham City University (BCU) have won two awards for excellence in diversity and inclusion, and both recognised the work of the Craft Expertise project and the We Gather exhibition. In November 2022 BCU picked up the award for Excellence in Diversity and Inclusion at the 2022 Multicultural Business and Community Champion (MBCC) awards. … Read More “Craft Expertise and We Gather featured in BCU award wins” »

Here are some photos from the launch of the We Gather exhibition, which was on at the Crafts Council Gallery until 12 March 2022. The exhibition was commissioned by the Craft Expertise project funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, and features new work by Shaheen Ahmed, Lorna Hamilton-Brown, Omeima Mudawi-Rowlings, Francisca Onumah and … Read More “Photos and visitor comments: We Gather Exhibition” »

As part of the Craft Expertise project we commissioned five makers to create pieces of work related to the project themes of diversity and inequalities in craft. This work will be shown at the Crafts Council Gallery as part of their 50th anniversary celebrations. The artists are Shaheen Ahmed, Lorna Hamilton-Brown, Omeima Mudawi-Rowlings, Francisca Onumah … Read More “We Gather exhibition” »

The recording of the ‘Making Changes in Craft‘ event, which took place on 29th June 2021, is now available to view below. The recording includes subtitles.

On Tuesday 29th June 2021 project lead Karen Patel presented the findings and recommendations from Phase 1 of the Craft Expertise project at the event Making Changes in Craft. The final report, available to download here, is the culmination of two years of research with makers from around the UK. The aim of the first … Read More “‘Making Changes in Craft’ report, and Craft Expertise Phase 2 launch” »

Image credit: Mariam Syed, Textile Designer As part of the Craft Expertise project we have commissioned five craft artists to produce a piece of work related to the project themes of diversity in craft. The artists are Shaheen Ahmed, Lorna Hamilton-Brown, Omeima Mudawi-Rowlings, Francisca Onumah and Onome Otite. On 25 May they shared their work … Read More “Video: artist work in progress event” »

We are holding two events in the next month as part of the project: Artist work in progress – tackling racism and inequality in craft. Tuesday 25 May, 2pm. Register on Eventbrite In this event, the five artists we have commissioned to produce work for an exhibition at the Crafts Council gallery in November 2021 … Read More “Upcoming events: Work in Progress (25 May) and Making Changes in Craft (29 June)” »

On Tuesday February 16th we held an online event for this project in which I presented further findings from the research, gathered some more ideas for action to address inequalities in craft, and got to hear from some fantastic craft artists we are commissioning. You can watch my research presentation portion of the event below. … Read More “‘Tackling racism and inequalities in craft’ event and second working paper” »

In November and December 2020 I ran a three-day online workshop series for the project in collaboration with STEAMhouse in Birmingham. You can read a full recap of the workshops including methods and insights over at the Research Blog.

In July 2020 I participated in an open forum organised by the Craft Expertise project partner, Crafts Council UK. The forum aimed to: Publicly acknowledge Crafts Council’s responsibility for deconstructing racism, both within their organisation and the craft sector as a whole and commit to addressing this. Frame and outline some of the ways that … Read More “Crafts Council forum on racism and inequality in the craft sector” »

I was pleased to be a part of this article in Crafts Magazine, which features comment from 7 people on diversity and inequalities in the craft sector. An extract from my contribution is below, you can read the full article here. “While some areas of the UK craft ecology do represent the diversity of British … Read More “Feature for Crafts Magazine – how can the craft world address its lack of diversity?” »

For Soundings journal I have written a blog post about the current conjuncture – where the impacts of COVID-19 are disproportionately affecting people of colour and working class people in the UK, and we’ve seen the increased attention on the Black Lives Matter movement after George Floyd was killed in police custody in Minneapolis earlier … Read More “Blog post for Soundings Journal” »

In June 2020 I presented at the Creative Industries Policy & Evidence Centre Seminar series, which was organised by Nesta and King’s College London. I presented the latest research from the Craft Expertise project as part of the session on ‘Creative Industries and Intersectional Barriers’. You can listen to the full audio from the session … Read More “Creative Industries Policy and Evidence Centre Seminar” »

It is now almost a year into this project ‘Supporting Diversity and Expertise Development in the Contemporary Craft Economy’, short name ‘Craft Expertise’. In November 2019 I presented initial findings from my interviews and observations to the Crafts Council team. I have written up my presentation into an informal working paper, which highlights the experiences … Read More “First project working paper now published” »

The Maker Stories Podcast series is now live. The first two episodes feature Jasmine Carey, a designer-maker for Deco 22, and Rose Sinclair, a lecturer in design (textiles) at Goldsmiths, University of London. Both talk about their journeys into craft and their experiences as Black women in the sector. More episodes to come in the … Read More “Maker Stories Podcast Series now live” »

Registration is now open for the project conference which is taking place at STEAMHouse Birmingham on Wednesday 4th December 2019. See the Event page for more information.

On 6 September 2019 Karen presented at the CAMEo conference at the University of Leicester on her work on challenges for women makers of colour online. You can read Karen’s summary of the conference and link to her paper on the Birmingham Centre for Media and Cultural Research website.

We are looking for participants who would like to be interviewed for this project. Craft Expertise is a 2-year Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) funded project in collaboration with Crafts Council UK, which is exploring and seeking to address inequalities in the craft sector. The project lead, Dr Karen Patel of Birmingham City University, … Read More “Call for participants” »

Wednesday 4th December 2019, STEAMHouse, Birmingham Craft in the creative economy has seen significant growth in the past ten years, in what is perceived to be a ‘return to artisanal employment’ (Nesta, 2017). It has been argued that this growth is driven partly by the proliferation of online sites such as Etsy, as well as … Read More “Call for Contributions: Craft Economies – Inequalities, Opportunities and Interventions” »

Karen Patel was invited by the Work, Inequalities and Lifecourse research group at Southampton Solent University on 27 March to speak about her research on women makers of colour.