I have spent the larger part of this year engrossed in a very special project. From March to April my partner in crime Sara and I took over a disused shop in Chalk Farm, North London, and turned it into a storytelling craft centre. 'Liminal Space' was inspired by the magical power of fairytales and folk tales, in combination with archaic, mysterious visual storytelling craft techniques.
Each week we had a different folk tale theme, and our workshops drew imagery and ideas from these stories. Stories were cut up and put into story bags, moments were fished out and visual worlds created using pop-up and paper automata, toy theatre, crankie, mask and puppet-making techniques.
Down in the basement, a medieval king and queen guarded the Storytelling Den, complete with its eternally renewing apple tree. There lights twinkled, witching songs were sung and tales told.
But now 'tis nothing but a disused dry cleaners again.
