Penland School of Crafts
Encyclopedia
The Penland School of Crafts (usually called simply "Penland") is a center for craft
education located in the Blue Ridge Mountains
in Spruce Pine, North Carolina
, about 50 miles from Asheville
.
The school was founded in the 1920s in the isolated mountain town of Penland, North Carolina. In 1923, Lucy Morgan, a schoolteacher who had recently learned to weave, created an association to teach the craft to local women as a way to give them a source of income. The center provided instruction, looms, and materials. Local volunteers built first a cabin and then a larger hall. In 1929, Penland was officially founded as the Penland School of Handicrafts. The school grew rapidly and began expanding into other crafts. By the 1950s, it was attracting students from around the world.
, Penland offered spring, summer, and fall workshops in a wide variety of craft disciplines, including pottery
, glassblowing
, metalworking
, weaving
and dyeing
, and woodworking
, as well as in subjects more traditionally considered fine art
s, such as painting
, photography
, and printmaking
. The school has no permanent faculty; the workshops are taught by visiting professors and artists from around the United States. Penland does not award academic degrees.
Penland holds an annual Community Day in early March. On this day most or all of the studios are open to people living near the school, who can take a tour around the grounds and then work on completing a small project with the help of the artists.
The distinctive architecture at Penland was designed primarily by architects based in North Carolina, including Frank Harmon (Raleigh, NC) and Dixon Weinstein Architects (Chapel Hill, NC).
Arts and crafts
Arts and crafts comprise a whole host of activities and hobbies that are related to making things with one's hands and skill. These can be sub-divided into handicrafts or "traditional crafts" and "the rest"...
education located in the Blue Ridge Mountains
Blue Ridge Mountains
The Blue Ridge Mountains are a physiographic province of the larger Appalachian Mountains range. This province consists of northern and southern physiographic regions, which divide near the Roanoke River gap. The mountain range is located in the eastern United States, starting at its southern-most...
in Spruce Pine, North Carolina
Spruce Pine, North Carolina
Spruce Pine is a town in Mitchell County, North Carolina, United States. The population was 2,175 at the 2010 census.-History:Spruce Pine was founded in 1907 when the Clinchfield Railroad made its way up the North Toe River from Erwin, Tennessee...
, about 50 miles from Asheville
Asheville, North Carolina
Asheville is a city in and the county seat of Buncombe County, North Carolina, United States. It is the largest city in Western North Carolina, and the 11th largest city in North Carolina. The City is home to the United States National Climatic Data Center , which is the world's largest active...
.
The school was founded in the 1920s in the isolated mountain town of Penland, North Carolina. In 1923, Lucy Morgan, a schoolteacher who had recently learned to weave, created an association to teach the craft to local women as a way to give them a source of income. The center provided instruction, looms, and materials. Local volunteers built first a cabin and then a larger hall. In 1929, Penland was officially founded as the Penland School of Handicrafts. The school grew rapidly and began expanding into other crafts. By the 1950s, it was attracting students from around the world.
, Penland offered spring, summer, and fall workshops in a wide variety of craft disciplines, including pottery
Pottery
Pottery is the material from which the potteryware is made, of which major types include earthenware, stoneware and porcelain. The place where such wares are made is also called a pottery . Pottery also refers to the art or craft of the potter or the manufacture of pottery...
, glassblowing
Glassblowing
Glassblowing is a glassforming technique that involves inflating molten glass into a bubble, or parison, with the aid of a blowpipe, or blow tube...
, metalworking
Metalworking
Metalworking is the process of working with metals to create individual parts, assemblies, or large scale structures. The term covers a wide range of work from large ships and bridges to precise engine parts and delicate jewelry. It therefore includes a correspondingly wide range of skills,...
, weaving
Weaving
Weaving is a method of fabric production in which two distinct sets of yarns or threads are interlaced at right angles to form a fabric or cloth. The other methods are knitting, lace making and felting. The longitudinal threads are called the warp and the lateral threads are the weft or filling...
and dyeing
Dyeing
Dyeing is the process of adding color to textile products like fibers, yarns, and fabrics. Dyeing is normally done in a special solution containing dyes and particular chemical material. After dyeing, dye molecules have uncut Chemical bond with fiber molecules. The temperature and time controlling...
, and woodworking
Woodworking
Woodworking is the process of building, making or carving something using wood.-History:Along with stone, mud, and animal parts, wood was one of the first materials worked by early humans. Microwear analysis of the Mousterian stone tools used by the Neanderthals show that many were used to work wood...
, as well as in subjects more traditionally considered fine art
Fine art
Fine art or the fine arts encompass art forms developed primarily for aesthetics and/or concept rather than practical application. Art is often a synonym for fine art, as employed in the term "art gallery"....
s, such as painting
Painting
Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a surface . The application of the medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush but other objects can be used. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action. However, painting is...
, photography
Photography
Photography is the art, science and practice of creating durable images by recording light or other electromagnetic radiation, either electronically by means of an image sensor or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film...
, and printmaking
Printmaking
Printmaking is the process of making artworks by printing, normally on paper. Printmaking normally covers only the process of creating prints with an element of originality, rather than just being a photographic reproduction of a painting. Except in the case of monotyping, the process is capable...
. The school has no permanent faculty; the workshops are taught by visiting professors and artists from around the United States. Penland does not award academic degrees.
Penland holds an annual Community Day in early March. On this day most or all of the studios are open to people living near the school, who can take a tour around the grounds and then work on completing a small project with the help of the artists.
The distinctive architecture at Penland was designed primarily by architects based in North Carolina, including Frank Harmon (Raleigh, NC) and Dixon Weinstein Architects (Chapel Hill, NC).