By Noah Roberts
Did you know that the much-loved Bramley Craft Group has reformed?
The group now meets at Bramley Baptist Church on the first and third Thursday of the month, from 7-9pm.
Over a dozen people met this week in the cosy Bramley Baptist Church Sunday School, Hough Lane, Bramley.
It’s a cosy community room with large tables for crafting. The organisers have a table with various books and crafts materials people can use.
This week they had been donated some festive wreath-making kits.
The group was very diverse with everyone chatting away while working on their own craft projects brought from home, or relaxing by drawing and painting.
The group is open to anyone and there is no charge. Hot and cold drinks and biscuits are available and donations are welcome on the night.
Local women Sarah Hutchinson, Chelsea Best and Julie Stevenson saw the need for a group, which formed in 2012.
Sarah said: “In addition to our craft club we also provided monthly themed workshops where people could pay to attend to learn a new craft or skill. For example, we had a popular session where we showed people how to make their own fascinators (an elaborate headpiece women wear for special occasions).
“We started the craft group and decided we wanted to make things so we could have our own craft fairs upstairs in the Bramley Sunday School.”
They said they don’t yet have plans to restart the craft fair, but it’s something that could be an idea for the future as they have been really well supported by the church.
They said the Sunday school is “such a great community space” which is open and available for people to use. If anyone is looking to host an event or group they can get in touch with Bramley Baptist Church for details.
Julie showed the group her artwork, which she started when younger at college. She hadn’t known much about art or crafting at the time and had been craft scrapbooking her thoughts and ideas using magazine cuttings and added painting, glitter, drawings of her own.
After becoming a parent Julie had to leave college and now lives with serious health issues and finds coming to a regular group helps with her mental wellbeing.
Julie started with simple doodles which now are called Zentangles. She finds doodling a form of mindfulness.
Mindfulness is a form of being deeply focused into an activity that you lose yourself, similar to feels meditative. Mindfulness is proven to have a positive impact on a person’s physical and mental health, lowering blood pressure and reducing negative thoughts.
Julie who is also a Deacon for Bramley Baptist and was a regular at the Armley Doodle Chat, which stopped earlier this year due to a lack of funding. She saw a need in her local area and got in touch with Chelsea and Sarah to see if they would be interested in restarting the craft club.
Doodle Chat still has free local meet ups at Left Bank and Thackray Medical Museum, which Julie will drop into if she visits St James’s Hospital.
The timing was perfect for one group member Sharon Devereux, who had just moved near to the church.
Sharon is single mother to three teens and member of Leeds West Academy parent teacher committee. She said: “I was so happy when I heard the group was restarting!
“It was perfect timing as I had just moved which was stressful and I’ve a lot going on, it can be a lot raising three teens as a single parent I don’t often have time for me. This is something for myself. It’s great that it’s in the Sunday school as the Baptist church is an important place to me.”
This week at group Sarah was busy make a Christmas scene using Christmas trees and snow she has made with her 3D printer.
Sharon sells her handmade crafts and said she had helped organise a community event on Wednesday, 10 December, 5-7pm at Leeds West Academy where they will have craft stalls and a Christmas market.
This is one of the biggest events the committee has hosted so far and she is hoping it will be well received by the community.
Sharon’s teenagers sometimes get involved help her as she has a regular stall at Pudsey Market (craft) and the Little Leaf market at Palmer Plants.
Sarah says that the social part of being part of the group is just as important to people as the crafting “some of my best friends have come from this group”.
The group had stopped in 2018 just after its fifth birthday and was a loss for the community. The group meet next on 18 December. There will then be a short break over the festive period and the group will start meeting again from the 15 January 2026.
According to Chelsea the group lives up to her surname as she thinks it’s is one of the “best” craft clubs in west Leeds. More details can be found on the group’s Facebook page.
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