In order to share the love for creativity with children, the Ambachtenbus offers engaging workshops led by the enthusiastic Bram Korte.
Craftsmanship is becoming less visible in today’s society. By creating something themselves, children experience the joy of making and discover that it is not always as easy as it looks.
Giving children this experience aligns with one of the goals of Ambachtelijk Vakmanschap Nederland: to pass on the love for making and to place greater value on traditional craftsmanship.
The bus is equipped with hand tools, technical workstations, and reclaimed materials, allowing children aged 8 and up to get started under guidance.
Offered by platform Ambachtelijk Vakmanschap Nederland.
Ibrahim is from Sudan and is a carpenter. He is very skilled with wood and worked in Sudan as a furniture maker, using recycled wood.
In this workshop, children of all ages can learn basic woodworking skills. You will build a wooden toy car that can actually drive.
During this ongoing workshop, especially for children, you’ll learn to create a shape in aluminum. This way, you’ll discover the various forging techniques in a playful way.
Come and watch the blacksmith, try your hand at crafting, and visit the traveling exhibition “On a Visit.”
The workshops are led by experts in gold and silversmithing.
You’ll go home with your own creation.
The Dutch Silver Museum in Schoonhoven is committed to showcasing and preserving the craft of silversmithing. Visitors can see, feel, smell, and hear silver, and discover much more about this versatile precious metal in the World of Silver. With regularly changing exhibitions and activities, it’s worth coming back!
Print your own poster with wooden letters? Yes, you can!
GWA – Grafische Werkplaats Amsterdam is bringing a small printing press, antique wooden letters, and ink again to the Ambacht in Beeld Festival. With these, you can design and print your very own personal poster.
GWA’s workshop, located nearby in the NDSM Loods, has an extensive collection of traditional graphic materials: printing presses, wooden letters, lead type, and everything you need for linocut, woodcut, and bookbinding. The foundation offers courses and workshops to anyone who wants to work with traditional printing techniques school classes, graphic students, artists, and lovers of handcrafted printwork. Step away from the computer!
This workshop is open to everyone from 8 years and older. You will work together with one other participant to create your own poster. The poster won’t be dry immediately; it’s best to let it hang as long as possible before taking it home, or you can pick it up later at the workshop.
In this inspiring session, you will create a small, colourful painting. You’ll learn how to recognize shapes within abstract backgrounds and discover the magic of various painting techniques.
We’ll work with acrylic paints, pencils, and ink, allowing you to develop your own unique style. Whether you’re a beginner or have some experience, let your creativity flow and join us for a fun painting session!
By the end of the workshop, you’ll take home a beautiful, self-made painting that sparks your imagination and deserves a special place in your home.
This workshop is also offered to participants aged 13 and up. Check the available times here.
Visual artist Kinga Wieczorek grew up in Zbąszyń, Poland. She graduated cum laude in 2008 from the Lyceum for Visual Arts in Zielona Góra, specializing in visual advertising, painting, and art history. From 2009 to 2016, she collaborated with Galerie Pretekst in Krakow, and her work was featured in the Polish film The Art of Loving.
Kinga mainly paints portraits in oil but also experiments with acrylic and texture paste, especially in landscapes. Her style is inspired by magical realism and realism, focusing on the connection between nature and humanity.
She caters to art lovers and private clients and offers a wide range of workshops and lessons in various techniques such as drawing, ink work, pastel, charcoal, acrylic, and oil painting. Kinga believes painting is a valuable investment in your own well-being. By first learning realistic drawing and painting, students can develop their own unique style.
Kinga now lives and works in Zaandam, where she runs her own studio. Besides her artistry, she teaches and serves as vice-chair of Stichting Tengel.
Practical information
Children’s workshop (age 11 and up). Parents/guardians are responsible at all times. Participation at your own risk, do not wear highly flammable clothing.
Together with the blacksmith, a bar of iron is heated in the fire, and this glowing iron is forged into a keychain. This is done by hammering the hot material on an anvil. You will go home with a unique keychain.
Two children can forge per 20-minute slot, with hourly time slots, so you may have to wait your turn.
Having started as a freelancer in the metal industry, Cees Pronk conducted research on blacksmithing courses in the Netherlands in 1999/2000. However, a good vocational training no longer existed, which led him to develop a blacksmithing course himself. The end terms he wrote, approved by the Ministry of Education, Culture, and Science (OCW), served as the basis for compiling and writing teaching materials for the Blacksmithing Course in Andelst and the establishment of Mondra Training. In addition to the Blacksmithing Course, various workshops and masterclasses are also offered for young and old, artists, and primary school students. All of this takes place at the Cornelis Pronk Forge, the place to gain knowledge about forging techniques.
As of January 1, 2024, Cornelis Pronk Forge has been handed over to his daughter Lotte Pronk, keeping the business in the family.
Practical information
The exhibition Made in China features the work of Chinese artist Yang Yongliang. From a distance, his artwork looks like a traditional Chinese shanshui (“mountains and water”) landscape painting done with ink on paper. But when you look closer, you don’t see mountains — instead, you see a photo collage of skyscrapers! And what appear to be trees from afar are actually construction cranes.
During the workshop, you’ll be inspired by this artwork and create your own landscape using stamps on a roll of paper.
You’ll go home with your very own handmade scroll painting.
Made in China is on display from October 17 at the Wereldmuseum Amsterdam. The Wereldmuseum uses China as a case study for a fresh perspective on craftsmanship. The exhibition presents China’s making culture—a tradition that is both centuries old and vibrantly alive—through a mix of objects, art, fashion, photographs, and videos. It also explores the diverse meanings of “making” among contemporary artists and designers such as Cao Fei, Susan Fang, Jing He, Ma Ke, and Yang Yongliang.
Practical information:
Together with a team of enthusiastic carpenters, both women and men, you will get to work with wood, hammers, and drills to build a real tiny house (in miniature, of course)!
Perfect for anyone who wants to saw, drill, screw, hammer, or simply enjoy working with their hands.
The workshop is led by a group of skilled craftspeople who are passionate about sharing their love for wood and building with the next generation of makers.
For young and older children who are excited to create something wonderful!
The team includes Claudia Glazener, Basile Marée, Remy Becker, Daan van de Gender, Boris Bus, Eva de Boer, Brandaan Hofman, and Lika Kortmann.
Young children must be supervised by a parent or guardian. Parents/guardians are always fully responsible for their child. The festival accepts no liability.
In this weaving workshop for children aged 6 to 12, you will be introduced to a simple weaving technique, working on wooden animal-shaped looms.
You will go home with your own handmade creation.
Julia Woch (1996, Poland) is an artist and weaver based in Amsterdam. She has a background in architecture (Bachelor at the Cracow University of Technology, master’s in interior architecture research at the Piet Zwart Institute in Rotterdam), with a focus on artistic and architectural illustration.
Julia explores and experiments with strategies for feminist spatial design and community building. Her greatest ambition is to combine the disciplines of weaving and spatial planning to practice art and craft in an integrated way. She teaches weaving workshops to both children and adults.
Practical Information
Choose from a dozen objects, from animals to pendants, and create your own piece by casting, sawing, clamping, filing, and polishing with a copper brush or steel wool.
You’ll go home with your handmade figurine in a lovely little pouch.
The craft of pewter casting dates back to Roman times. During the Middle Ages, it was used to make plates, spoons, cups, and pitchers. De Tinnen Lepel practices this age-old craft in a contemporary way, creating animals, pendants, toy soldiers, and various other objects using both traditional and modern casting techniques.
Roger van Driel has been passionately practicing the art of pewter casting for over nine years. He enjoys sharing his knowledge about the different casting and finishing techniques.
Practical Information
Festival address:
NDSM Loods
NDSM-Plein 85
1033 WC Amsterdam
Postal address:
Stichting Ambacht in Beeld
Kalf 158
1509AH Zaandam
The Netherlands
