Eeeuuurrrrggggghhhhhhh!
Posted by Sonja
December 11, 2008
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You know when someone gets their mucky hands on something you love and twists and turns it into something disgusting that makes you want to be sick?
Well, Channel 4 have got a new “craft” programme starting soon, with Kirsty Allsop presenting it. If you have a strong stomach, you can read all about it here, including this marvellously sick comment: “I had a baby just three months ago, and this project has almost become my second baby, so it’s like I’ve had twins.”
If you need an antidote to this, go to the Handmade Nation website, to find out about a lovingly crafted film that’s been made by a proper crafty girl using the same honest values as the craftspeople it features.
7 comments Categories: craft
December 11th, 2008 at 2:20 pm
What’s so wrong with a mainstream programme that promotes the idea of handmade stuff – either made by a craftsperson or homemade? I don’t understand why you have to be a “proper” crafty person to be into making your own stuff – indeed, aren’t you one of those by definition when you decide to make things? Maybe you didn’t mean it to sound like this, but it smacks of craftier-than-thou snobbery to me.
I’m not being disingenuous and pretending that I can’t see the difference between the film you linked to and this programme, but I don’t think that one is necessarily worse than the other – they’re very different things aimed at different markets is all. I think the Channel 4 programme might make crafting accessible to people who might be put of by the hipper, more youth-centric end of the modern craft industry, and I don’t think that’s a bad thing. Heck, I love a bit of Martha Stewart.
Crafting’s a broad church, and it’s not just for people who share your values or specific interests. It’s like reading or cooking – people engage with it in very different ways, and at very different levels.
December 13th, 2008 at 8:45 pm
While that baby comment is rather scary, on the whole I’m with Kerry on this one – crafters come in all shapes and sizes and good on ‘em! I’ll be the first to admit that I’m a giant book snob, but when it comes to crafting, I advocate DIY culture in all its guises, from ultra-hip London fayre to twee paint-by-number almost craft. The ‘danger’, of course, is that this just spawns another brand of identikit culture, but we don’t yet know how Kirstie and Channel 4 are going to handle the programme – hopefully, well, if not, we just don’t have to watch.
There always being another hand, though, I do get where you’re coming from with being a mite miffed that something that you consider special to you becomes rather more mainstream. It’s hard to explain or justify why, but feelings of betrayal do creep in when that happens.
December 15th, 2008 at 1:01 pm
I can’t speak for Sonja here, but for me, the problem is not about something going ‘mainstream’, it’s about stripping crafting of any values like self-reliance, anti-waste, the value of the artisan, and community (especially that of female creativity), and making it an aspirational lifestyle you can buy into with no thought or effort. The new organic food.
I hope I’m proved wrong obviously, but when has Kirstie shown any interest in crafts before? The way TV factual entertainment commissioning works makes me instantly cynical – they spot a ‘trend’, they want to make a show on it as quickly and as emptily as possible, regardless of how superficial that may be. If this show is unlike a standard-issue bitesize fashion show encouraging you to buy things, I’ll be amazed
You’re both right, though, that people appreciate crafting on different levels – this show will appeal to people, so I think it’ll be a success, but on first looks it has nothing in common with the values I place in crafting culture.
December 15th, 2008 at 3:42 pm
Kirsty Allsop has previously worked on Country Living and Food & Homes magazine, and prior to Location was an interior designer. I’d say its fair to her to say she has an eye for design and an interest in creativity, even if she isn’t known for crafting.
Its not like a mainstream programme can ever take away the things you do yourself. If the programme is badly made and annoying, its not going to make me bake, cook or paint any worse. Its not going to reduce my creativity to an hollow aspirational lifestyle choice, or cheapen what I create. It may even inspire some people to try making things for themselves when they had previously thought themselves incapable of doing so.
December 15th, 2008 at 5:10 pm
Hi Emily,
But thing is I’d say that having seen what she thinks looks good on Location (I’ve watched a lot of them!) she does have an eye for design and creativity, yes, but it’s not an eye of good taste. But more to the point, she’s demonstrably about profit and surface, not thrift and ethics, which to me are essential elements – so yeah I totally think this is a difference in attitudes of what values are attached to crafting.
But truly this isn’t a problem I have with it being a mainstream programme, I’d love a mainstream programme about crafting presented by someone who I admire!
December 16th, 2008 at 4:54 pm
Charlie – thanks very much for your thoughts!
I do understand why you must be disappointed with the idea of a programme that has little to do with your experiences and values, but I guess I still can’t get cross about it – to me, it’s throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
I don’t think it’s fair to say that this programme will strip away all the values you mentioned – I don’t see how a programme aimed primarily at a female audience that is about making things by hand and supporting local craftspeople can possibly strip away the ideas of female creativity and the value of the artisan, for example. I think it’s fairer to say that it’s likely to represent a very commodified version of crafting, of the type represented by card-making kits, glossy craft mags, etc. – something that, as you state, has little in common with all of the values you attach to crafting, but that I feel shouldn’t be discounted just because of this.
My comment wasn’t an attempt to tell anyone that they have to like the programme or not talk negatively about it – I honestly couldn’t care less about Kirstie, and I don’t have a telly – but I was stung by something that you see an awful lot of online, an frequently unexamined assumption that all “proper” crafters share the same values, and that anyone who doesn’t share all of these isn’t really a part of the community. I genuinely can’t get on board with this idea – I really do think that there are as many different ideas about crafting as there are people who craft, and that sort of diversity can only be a good thing.
Even when they disagree with you. ;)
May 16th, 2009 at 9:56 am
I’ve been watching the series and have enjoyed it – there are bits that make me cringe, such as when she is trying to show you how to get a bargain then spends £55 on a doorknob, or when she pays with £50 notes at markets, or says “This is a craft anyone can do – it only costs £200 to get started”.
But I like that there is a program I can watch and enjoy and get ideas from. And anything that promotes buying locally / from local craftspeople / reusing is always good :)
Has anyone else been watching it?