IN OUR HANDS
Empowering women, girls and gender diverse folk through carpentry, woodcraft and DIY
WHO ARE WE
We are one of the only workshops of our kind in the country. Since 2022 we have offered radically affordable and inclusive courses in basic sustainable carpentry, woodwork and DIY - our non-profit services are specifically for women, girls, and gender diverse people. Through expert facilitation we dismantle the inaccessible nature of tool-based environments and create unique workshops for confidence growth, skill learning and community.
Taught and led by women and gender diverse tutors, we create a relaxed, empowering and inspirational environment where participants learn at their own pace, encouraged to listen to innate intuition and their own body. There is no such thing as a failure or mistake - we take every part of the process as valuable and remove fear and judgement from what can be a very intimidating environment. We are a fully lgbtq+ team and are proud to have created a safe rural space for queer people. Read more about us here.
Whether it's being able to mend your own cupboard doors, put up shelves, build a shed or construct your own home, the limits are your determination, not your gender. We want to reform outdated and immobilising narratives that women and AFAB people are physically and mentally not as capable as men to build.
We re-use 100% waste construction timber and stormfell greenwood for all our courses, teaching learners extremely sustainable, affordable and accessible building principles.
FUNDED BY
WHAT DO WE DO
We run a variety of pay-what-you-can carpentry and DIY courses for the public. Supported by grant funding our services are extremely financially inclusive meaning well over 50% of our attendees have been unemployed and low income. We also run sliding scale wood-craft courses such as greenwood carving and joinery workshops.
As well as public and private classes we run specialised workshops with charities supporting members of the local community with tool and DIY skills. These are designed uniquely for their service users and marginalised people to focus directly on confidence growth, physical empowerment, social connection and creative exploration.
Everything we do, we offer as a private booking too for business away days, community groups and groups of friends.
Please see below for more information on our services.
2027 statement:
For the next year our focus will be mainly on supported sessions with charities and working with marginalised people. We will be running a far quieter year for public pay-what-you-can carpentry/DIY classes and these will be as and when staff have capacity. We will however be taking bookings for private workshops if you, a couple, a group of friends and family or community network would like to book a carpentry, greenwood or DIY class.
SUPPORTED WORKSHOPS
Our supported workshops and 'woodwork wellbeing' sessions with charities and community groups grow confidence, self-reliance and boost wellbeing. We use the therapeutic and empowering nature of craft and manual skills to reach marginalised and underserved members of our community, including our local LGBTQ+ network.
PUBLIC AND PRIVATE WORKSHOPS
Since 2022 we have run radically affordable carpentry, DIY and wood-craft courses. These range from everyday tool skills and carpentry basics to heritage craft and greenwood classes. We also run all our workshops as private and 1-2-1 classes, as well as bespoke experiences for groups and businesses.
COMMUNITY & WORKSHOP REBUILD
A core aim of In Our Hands is for the project to be shaped and developed by the people it serves. As well as inviting our local and wider community to have a say in what we do, we’ve offered regular volunteering & community events for years that offer non-transactional ways to get involved in the project. Here people can learn new exciting carpentry skills whilst meeting like-minded people and contribute to the continuous rebuild/improvement of our workshop space! Read more to see the amazing work we’ve done together rebuilding our barn and developing a wellbeing garden.
COMMISSIONS, TRAINING & PUBLIC TALKS
Our team has an extremely varied skill-set and we are open to and enjoy carpentry/wood-craft commissions. We also have delivered unique talks and training. We have years of focused and highly honed facilitation skills particularly surrounding accessible and inclusive teaching, neurodivergent awareness in learning environments and how to empower women on the tools. Reach out to learn more.
