Instrument making.
It’s guaranteed to add a string to your bow.
As are the many of the other fine creative endeavours that we’ve listed here, from tightrope walking to anthropomorphic animal taxidermy – all in the name of helping you on your true path to becoming a creative genius. And by the time you’ve worked through these excellent creative workshops in London…
…you’re gonna need a bigger bow.
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Pottery Classes
Throwing’s catching on. And you can get in on the pottery action at Turning Earth, an open studio and creative workspace for amateur and professional potters alike. If you’re new to ceramics, they also run classes at their original Hoxton studio, so you can try your hand before making a bid for a workspace. South Londoners, you might want to check The Kiln Rooms out. They’re based in Peckham’s Bussey Building and offer one-off, four-week, or twelve-week courses for both beginners and intermediates. See more pottery classes in London
Also try: Pottery painting at Battersea’s Pottery Café, where you’ll be free to unleash your creativity on a pot that’s already been beautifully crafted by a professional.
Details: Turning Earth Hoxton: Arches 361-362, Whiston Road, E2 8BW, The Kiln Rooms: Unit 202, Level 2, Peckham Town Centre Carpark, 95A Rye Lane, SE15 4ST | From £75 for a taster class at Turning Earth (3hrs) and £110 at The Kiln Rooms (4.5hrs)
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Life Drawing
Life drawing: guaranteed to make you feel better – whatever your level of artistry – because at least you’re not the one naked person standing in a room of fully clothed people. London Drawing run regular drop-in sessions at unusual spaces around London including Pop Brixton and Bourne & Hollingsworth Buildings‘ basement den, as well as day workshops designed to help you get a better grasp on nudes. Artistically speaking.
Also try: Wild Life Drawing, whose models include wolves, micropigs and owls, and Hacknakey, which comes with a live soundtrack courtesy of a naked band.
Details: Across London | Drop-ins £10-15, one day workshops £95
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Floristry Workshops
The art of flower arranging is vasely underestimated. The Flower Appreciation Society offers one day workshops on everything from creating floral headbands to three-day crash-courses in professional floristry. And if you’re in it for the long term, McQueens floristry school resides in a bright and handsome building in Mayfair, where they offer everything from fancy half-day workshops to month-long courses specifically designed as vocational training.
Details: TFAS | BE Studios, 72a Southgate Road, N1 3JF | From £85
McQueens 29 North Audley Street, London, W1K 6WY | From £210
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Perfume Making
If you’re nosy about perfume making, book yourself into a luxe private blending experience at Experimental Perfume Club. You’ll be welcomed into the ‘perfumer’s alcove’ of their laboratory-boutique in Covent Garden, where you’ll learn how to navigate different fragrance families and balance notes to develop your own individual scent. All classes include a 50ml bottle of your bespoke fragrance to take home, as well as the fragrance formula – meaning you can go back and recreate it whenever you want.
Details: 53 Monmouth Street, London WC2H 9DG | £195
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Foraging Walks
George ‘Flavour Fred’ Fredenham supplies a number of London’s top bars and restaurants with his foraged bits and bobs, and has been an expert in his field – and those all over the city – for more than two decades. His 2.5 hour walks are legendary, where you’ll learn to recognise mushrooms, plants and berries that you can pick and eat, as well as pick up a little natural history and folklore along the way.
Details: Check locations & upcoming dates here | From £40
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Candle-Making
If you have a burning desire to become a candle-maker, you can do, at Earl of East on Regent Street. They offer both beginner and intermediate classes where – after a warm-up glass of prosecco – you’ll learn about everything from picking and balancing scents, to pouring and setting your candle, which you then get to take home.
Also try: Yougi’s candle-making workshops in Spitalfields, which use all-natural and sustainably sourced ingredients.
Details: Quadrant Arcade, 80 Regent Street, London W1B 5RL | £55
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Mosaics
Mosaics.
Even if you make a bad one, it still looks like you smashed it.
And the London School of Mosaic is so passionate about the artform, they run an official degree programme in mosaic-making. Of course, if you just want to dip your toe, there are short courses and one-day workshops that’ll give you a solid insight into the craft.
Details: 181 Mansfield Road, NW3 2HP | From £110
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Circus Skills
If you’ve ever wanted to run away and join the circus in a controlled and professionally-overseen manner, then look no further than the National Centre for Circus Arts in Hoxton. They cater for all levels of commitment, from circus fitness classes (which we can only imagine consists of long distance pie-throwing and unicycle spinning classes), to longer courses and even pro qualifications in aerial silks, acrobalance and tightrope walking.
Details: National Centre for Circus Arts, Coronet Street, N1 6HD | From £17 for a taster class
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Sewing & Dyeing
Yodomo
Fabrications is a little independent sewing school perched on Broadway Market, which offers classes and workshops on dressmaking, basic sewing, macramé – and specialises in traditional Japanese techniques like shibori (a kind of distinctive indigo tie-dye) and sashiko embroidery.
Details: 7 Broadway Market, London E8 4PH | From £55
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Sonsoles Print Studio
Sonsoles’ day-long beginners’ workshop promises a thorough introduction to the world of screen printing, including hand-making your own stencils and creating some custom art to take home. And after that? You can brush up some more with the weekly courses, or join as a member and enjoy unbridled access to their facilities.
Details: Unit 11, Print Village, Chadwick Road, Peckham, SE15 4PU | £95
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Art and Design
You could spend hours researching art classes in London, but at some point you need to draw a line. Putney School of Art and Design is a welcoming little gem tucked behind Putney High Street, offering both intensive and longer term courses in all sorts of visual arts, from botanical illustration to screen printing and etching.
Details: 46 Oxford Road, SW15 2LQ | From £70
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Taxidermy
Wish you had a cute pet hedgehog but just don’t have the resources? You can get the next best thing by stuffing a former mammal, reptile or bird of your choice at these fascinating taxidermy classes (costumes optional). Classes also run sporadically at the atmospheric St. Bart’s Pathology Museum, if you’ve got the guts.
Details: Secret Location | From £50
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The Goodlife Centre
Vic Phillips
This school near the Tate Modern is all about empowering people to DIY, and specialises in basic plumbing, electrics, and the like. But you can also learn creative pursuits here: their courses include hand-caning furniture, Japanese woodwork, paper marbling, soap making and more.
Details: 49-55 Great Guildford Street, London, SE1 0ES | From £125 for a day course
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Letterpress Printing
The St Bride Foundation was built 126 years ago to service the printers of Fleet Street, with baths, a laundry, a library and more. Now, the old gymnasium has been converted into a workshop space, where you can learn all kinds of printing craft – particularly letterpress (for that old-school, embossed effect), bookbinding and wood engraving.
Details: St Bride Foundation, 14 Bride Lane, Fleet Street, EC4Y 8EQ | £120
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Clowning
Clowning is very difficult.
So before you scoff, try walking a mile in their shoes.
And fear not, this isn’t a terrifying convention of red nosed, pie-wielding maniacs that are the stuff of nightmares. Instead, it’s clowning in the traditional sense – think Laurel and Hardy and Buster Keaton. Spymonkey’s week-long courses are for performers and lay folk alike, comprising a series of workshops that ultimately teach you to deal very, very well with embarrassment.
Details: Across London | From £400 for a week’s intensive
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Brass Instruments
If you’ve ever wanted to blow your own trumpet, this is the place to do it. London Metropolitan Brass run an eight-week beginners’ course every January. It’s completely free to hire an instrument with them, and there’ll be more experienced players on hand to show you the ropes. Which is useful, because they’re often completely invisible on brass instruments.
Details: Stroud Green Primary School, Woodstock Road, N4 3EX | Free, inc. instrument hire
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Morris Dancing (and other folk traditions)
If you’ve ever wondered what all the song and dance is about, you can get stuck into some ye olde activities organised by the English Folk Dance and Song Society at Camden’s grand Cecil Sharp House. There are regular ceilidhs and country (including Morris) dancing nights, a capella folk song classes, or you can even pick up the accordion – though that might be a bit of a stretch.
Details: Cecil Sharp House, 2 Regent’s Park Road, NW1 7AY | From £9.50 drop-in
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Batik
If you’re the sort of person who can’t resist the urge to mess around with melty candles on a dinner table, batik could be a good creative outlet for you. A traditional Indonesian fabric craft, batik uses hot wax to define borders between brush-dyed sections of fabric, to create something like the textile equivalent of stained glass. Talking of which…
Details: Morley College, 61 Westminster Bridge Road, SE1 7HT | From £115
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Stained Glass
This is a workshop where you take the lead…
…and then mould it around shards of coloured glass. Stoke Newington’s Rainbow Glass Studios run introductory day courses in stained glass making, as well as evening workshops and classes in enamel jewellery and glass painting.
Details: 172 Stoke Newington Church Street, N16 0JL | £170
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Poetry
Poetry jokes can be really bard. Poetry classes, however, can be really good – especially the ones held by Out-spoken. With help from an experienced wordsmith/host, you’ll be turned into a serious sonneteer in no time (or, you know, four to six weeks).
Details: Online | £600 for four weeks (payable in instalments)
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Book Binding
If you’re the kind of person who gets easily glued to books, this might not be for you. But if you’re the kind of person who wants to learn how to hand-stitch and bind books with beautiful handmade paper in the cosy surrounds of an open-access print studio in Hackney Wick, then by all means head along.
Details: London Centre for Book Arts, Britannia Works, 56 Dace Road, London E3 2NQ | From £125
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Traditional Arts
If you’re looking for more unusual creative workshops in London, amp it up a notch at the School of Traditional Arts, whose courses delve deep into the traditional crafts of cultures from around the world, covering everything from ornamental wood carving to mural painting inspired by the Buddhist caves of Dunhuang. Which you’re probably already familiar with, but it’s always worth brushing up on these things.
Details: 19–22 Charlotte Road, EC2A 3SG | From £10
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Sketching at the National Gallery
If you’ve ever wondered what all those sketchy looking people are doing in museums, well – here’s your chance to join them. The National Gallery – one of London’s most iconic repositories of art and sculpture – regularly opens its doors after hours for guided sessions, often including live models who interact with the art in new and interesting ways.
Details: Trafalgar Square, London, WC2N 5DN | Often free
And now, just to find a class on decision-making…
Now that you’re signed up to the best creative workshops in London… ride the wave and tackle these excellent cookery classes, too
