Focus on Collectives

Did you know that the County of Brant is home to many collectives, a place where artists and artisans sell unique handmade goods and collected items?

Be sure to stop by our local collectives:

• The Burford Collective
• Classic Vault Emporium
• The Gem
• Wincey Mills

Artisans and crafters have played an important role in shaping our community. Our makers make us distinguishable from any other nearby town. Buying from artisans connects us to the regional crafts and customs. It is a personal encounter with a maker when you buy local, much like buying food from a farm market. 

As seen in the collectives, making binds different kinds of people together, and that is true no matter how the making is done. What happens when a maker, tool and material come together is sophistication, there is also a magic that sparks when makers come together.

Makers bring a unique variation when executing a task and will bring a whole lifetime of observation to their craft, meaning each piece is one of a kind. Each maker has a mental archive of skills built over a lifetime is like a library where items can be called up at will, within the library there might be basic techniques taught in formal training sessions, but an important piece of the learning process will be the tricks of the trade picked up by watching others work.

When we become aware of special things crafted in the County, we are also conscious of being part of a community. By connecting with material objects, we are linking to who we are and where we came from.

The County of Brant has shone through its rural crafts.

Examples of goods and activities produced by rural crafts would be:

• Basketry
• Boat Building
• Building Stone Walls
• Fish Traps and Fishing Poles
• Hedge Laying
• Fences
• Ponds
• Pottery
• Spinning Yarn

Rural crafts will tend to vary in their styles from place to place and will thus often contribute strongly to a sense of place.