Put away the phone and come craft in Docklands

The Cauldron – craft connect, is a social crafting program supported by the City of Melbourne. It started as a simple community connection idea formed from discussions by the Docklands Stakeholder Group.

The craft group has been operating since June 2024 with craft nights originally held at The Hub. From there it has grown into a wonderful permanent creative space in a shopfront in The District Docklands. You can find us at Shop 11, Wharf St, The District Docklands.

 Social crafting nights are now a popular weekly event – currently Tuesday nights 5pm to 7pm. They are a “drop in” style night where creatives can bring their own handcraft projects to work on in the company of others.

It’s an inclusive, creative space to put down your phone and pick up a needle, paint brush, glue stick, pen, etc.

Crafting nights are run by volunteers, so we do ask for a gold coin donation which helps to “keep the lights on”. Social crafting is currently an adult program, but we will soon be rolling out some parent/child sessions.

In March we will be putting together a calendar of events for the next few months that will include a variety of craft classes including hand quilting, tatting, toy making, knitting, crochet, and paper crafts inclusive of journal making, decoupage, stamping and card making.

Craft classes will generally have a fee attached to pay our teachers for their time, but we aim to keep this as low as possible so that all members of our community can join in, learn new skills and make new contacts in their neighbourhood.

March will see a focus on International Women’s Day with a class in Vintage Style Card Making to be held on March 20 from 6pm to 7.30pm. Bookings can be made via the “Try Booking” site. More classes will be added through the month.

To keep an eye on future classes please follow us on Instagram @thecauldroncraftconnect and Facebook.

The program would love to expand to offer a broad range of craft skills teaching and creative social events for the community to enjoy. So, if you are interested in teaching a craft in our space, we would love to hear from you.

Alternatively, if you would like to learn a specific craft skill, host a group event, hold a creative work bonding class, please feel free to contact us with suggestions: [email protected] •