Review: Illustrative Collage Class at Create98

August 21, 2019 by Ray Morgan

Now, I'm not a particularly arty person. My family are all blessed with the ability to paint and draw, and while I would love to be able to just pick up a sketch pad and a 4B pencil, I just haven't been blessed with this gift. 

So what better person to go to an art class at the lovely Create98 in Leigh Broadway? Teach me how to be arty! I signed up for a collage class taught by the very lovely and helpful Lizzie Ireland, who trained in fashion illustration. It was during 'Food and Drink' week at Create98 (a bit like when it's 'Bread Week' on Bake Off) so the evening class was themed around food.

I signed up with my friend Laura and we excitedly arrived to be offered a glass of wine, beer or prosecco. So far so loving it. Create98 is split over two floors, and upstairs was hosting a fish cookery evening, and we were downstairs in the cosy lower room, but we had the door open as it was such a nice evening. The table was awash with felt, paper, card, a million Sharpies, scissors, glue and all other kinds of materials for making our mixed media illustrative collage. It felt instantly exciting, like we were kids again.

Helpfully, Lizzie had already produced three examples of what we would be creating, collages themed around ice creams at the beach, fish and chips, and seafood. Not going to lie, they were brilliant and I felt slightly daunted that mine would be nowhere as good. BUT - Lizzie was incredibly encouraging, and helped us figure out what to do, what our theme would be, and soon enough I was ripping up bits of local vintage maps and making little cockleshells out of felt.

There was music playing, all of us chatting, and uber-host Christine kept our wine glasses topped up and even came in with nibbles for us. It was so fun to just cut things out, stick them on, mindful but also with wine. It was perfect.

Once we were happy with our collages, Lizzie framed them for us and they are ours to keep and take home. I cannot express how lovely evenings are at Create98. You feel like you've learned something, achieved something, and it inspires you to pursue the art more - my friend and I said we would love to do another one and create collages on a different theme. I could not recommend it more. 

Create98's autumn programme is out now, and you can book at https://create98.co.uk/