Thurso-based eco group invites you to a special day of celebration as the project concludes
A Thurso-based organisation working towards reducing waste and highlighting sustainable consumption is inviting people to a celebration of its work.
Highland Community Waste Partnership (HCWP) is throwing a leaving party and wants everyone to celebrate the accomplishments, new friendships and great experiences gained over the three years of the project’s duration, which is now coming to an end.
On February 1, from noon to 3pm, Thurso’s British Legion will turn into an “ashram of sustainability, climate action and zero waste living”, as HCWP will be joined, at the ‘Say Bye To Waste’ Sustainability Fair, by its collaborators, community and climate action organisations, fellow projects of Thurso Community Development Trust (TCDT), facilitators and instructors who ran multiple workshops and training courses that HCWP delivered to hundreds of members of the local community.
Oksana Iatsiuta, the HCWP project officer with TCDT, said: “The objective of this event is to remind us that, when heritage craft is being lost, we lose much more than just a skill.
“It is also the songs that our grandmas and their grandmas sang, it is our genetic memory that unites us with our ancestry. This concert brings traditional wool crafting into a contemporary context, as we blend the beautiful tunes of Kate Young with mesmerising motions of the crafters spinning, waulking and weaving wool.”
From a folk music background in Edinburgh, Kate Young has emerged as one Scotland’s most innovative composers and musicians. Her recently released album, Umbelliferæ, is largely inspired by plant lore and the traditional uses of wildflowers from across the UK.
Tickets for the show are available on the Lyth Art Centre website.
Oksana says she promises a “great warm atmosphere with lots of interesting displays and refreshments” available throughout the fair. “This is also your chance to take part in a fashion swap event that will be running at the British Legion on the day.”
She added: “Fashion swaps have become by far the most loved and popular zero waste events with the people of Caithness – so it’s no wonder that HCWP chose this type of event for their closure activity.”
More details about the swap are available on the TCDT website: www.thursocdt.co.uk/upcomingevents/say-bye-to-waste-fair-and-swap
HCWP will also demonstrate all the work it has done to rescue sheep wool from waste and reigniting interest in the cottage wool industry through the events of the Cycle of Wool.
Starting at 7pm at the Legion, the public will have the opportunity to witness a “fantastic fusion between contemporary interpretation of folk music by the talented Scottish musician Kate Young, and traditional crafts, in the music show, organised in collaboration with Lyth Art Centre”.
The idea of the show is inspired by the Cycle of Wool, the series of activities carried out by HCWP in the Thurso area to reimagine the sheep wool industry and rescue local sheep wool from waste.
HCWP is one of the projects being delivered by TCDT. It has been funded for the last three years by the National Lottery Climate Action Fund, to reduce waste and promote more sustainable consumption in the Highlands.
Coordinated by Keep Scotland Beautiful, TCDT was one of the eight community organisations throughout the Highlands that has worked together in the partnership to share ideas and resources, try out new concepts and build an understanding around what works for Highland communities in the field of sustainable living and waste reduction.
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