Summer Youth Sessions 2025
Major Youth Programme filled with art, nature, food, campfires, and sounds.
For age groups: 8–12 & 13–18.
We’re excited to launch a free four-week summer programme for young people in Bristol. It’s packed with creative workshops led by amazing local artists and makers – from screenprinting and mural-making to foraging, tile-making, sound exploration and pasta-making.
Whether you want to try something completely new or spend time doing what you already love, this is a chance to get hands-on, learn new skills, and be part of something fun and creative.
When
Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays across August 2025
Can I come to more than one session?
Yes, you can come along to one or two or as many sessions as you’d like
How much is it to join?
The activities are completely free, with free lunch provided.
Programme
Week 1 – 04 August
Seaside Visit
For ages 13–18
Tuesday 05 August / 11am–6pm
‘We’re all going to the seaside’ – join us for a fun trip to Brean Beach in Somerset!
Week 1 – 04 August
Natural Tile Making
For ages 8–12
Wednesday 06 August / 10:30am–2:30pm
Make your own tiles using local clay and natural materials. You’ll learn how to shape and decorate them using simple techniques.
Workshop by Community Pottery
No experience needed – just come ready to get creative (and a bit messy).
Week 2 – 11 August
Campfire
For ages 13–18
Tuesday 12 August, 4pm–6pm
Explore into St Anne’s woods and cook up s’mores, burgers, and hot dogs whilst we chat and enjoy being outside in nature.
Week 2 – 11 August
Screenprint & Stitch
For ages 13–18
Wednesday 13 August, 10.30am–2.30pm
Join illustrator Sanni for a relaxed session of screen printing and stitching.
You’ll design your own textile banner or wall hanging, layering up colours, shapes and stitched text to create something totally unique.
Week 2 – 11 August
Ghosts of the Sun (Cyanotype Printing)
For ages 13–18
Thursday 14 August, 10.30am–2.30pm
This hands-on workshop introduces you to cyanotype – one of the oldest photographic printing processes in history. We’ll use it to explore and tell stories inspired by our local ancient woodland.
Week 3 – 18 August
Campfire
For ages 13–18
Tuesday 12 August, 4pm–6pm
On our second visit to St Anne’s woods, you can cook up s’mores, burgers, and hot dogs whilst we chat and enjoy being outside in nature.
Week 3 – 18 August
Foraging & Food
For ages 8–12
Wednesday 20 August, 10.30am–2.30pm
We’ll head out into the woods to forage and explore the local landscape, learning about edible plants along the way. Back in the kitchen, we’ll make fresh laminated pasta using what we’ve found. It’s a hands-on, sensory day that ends with us sharing a meal we’ve made together.
Week 4 – 25 August
Campfire
For ages 13–18
Tuesday 12 August, 4pm–6pm
On our third visit to St Anne’s woods, you can cook up s’mores, burgers, and hot dogs whilst we chat and enjoy being outside in nature.
Week 4 – 25 August
Botanic Murals
For ages 13–18
Wednesday 27 August, 10.30am–2.30pm
Work together to design and create a large-scale mural using stencils and spray paint. You’ll learn about composition and scaling up artwork, and get the chance to express yourself on a big canvas in a collaborative, energetic workshop.
Week 4 – 25 August
Rhythms of the Earth
For ages 13–18
Thursday 28 August, 10.30am–2.30pm
Discover how the Earth creates sound. From tectonic rumbles to underground echoes, we’ll use guitar pedals, drawing machines and turntables to turn natural vibrations into experimental sound and visual art. A playful, hands-on session for anyone into music, nature or just making weird and wonderful things.
The Artists Running The Sessions
Melo (Esme) / @melo.grafic
Running: Botanic Murals
Melo (Esme) is a multimedia artist who works across mural and illustration, exploring themes of liveness, musicality, the body, strength, and playfulness. She continuously pushes the boundaries of her nostalgic cartoon style, with her painting and illustration styles mutually enhancing each other and growing more expansive and daring. The exploration of painting on a variety of surfaces has allowed her to broaden her practice, increasing its impact on communities and environments, such as reclaiming local spaces through bold public art.
Sanni Pyhänniska / @sannillustrates www.sannillustrates.com
Running: Screenprint & Stitch
Sanni Pyhänniska is a Finnish-born and Bristol-based artist, curator and printmaker. Her work creates connections between people, memory and nature in a magical world of bold colour, texture, and pattern. Leaning into the immediacy of making by hand, and the element of surprise in printmaking, experimentation and play make up a big part of her mark making. Imagined environments and drawn characters are her methods of telling a story and evoking a feeling.
Community Pottery / @thecommunitypottery / www.thecommunitypottery.co.uk
Running: Natural Tile Making
Dan is an artist and potter as well as being Co-Founder of The Community Pottery CIC. He loves making and nature, often interweaving pottery and nature together, whether that be through wood firing, using locally sourced clays or taking inspiration from the local surroundings. In my work, I tend to make small batches of ceramic products that I would like to have around my own home. I use the potters wheel for most of my work and particularly enjoy making teapots and homeware (plates/bowls/mugs) as well as ceramic tiles.
Jo Chalkblack / @chalkblack_jo
Running: Ghosts Of The Sun
Jo Chalkblack is a multidisciplinary artist working across mediums from projection and binaural sound recording to working with found objects and natural materials. She loves to uncover the extraordinary in the everyday. Her work invites people to reconnect—with nature, with each other, and with the often-overlooked stories hidden in the place where they live. Through playful exploration and hands-on creation, Jo’s approach helps shift perspective and see the world through a new lens. She shares skills that spark curiosity and empower others to experiment freely. For Jo, art is not about perfection—it’s about discovering together. She makes it easy to give new skills a go.
Elisa Bozzarelli / @cibomattobristol / www.cibomattobristol.co.uk
Running: Foraging & Food
Elisa is a co-founder of Cibomatto, a Bristol-based kitchen with an Italian soul, where she champions sustainable food inspired by Italy’s culinary heritage. Originally from Milan, she worked for over 15 years in design and illustration before moving to Bristol in 2017. With roots in rural life and farming, she blends her creative background with hands-on traditions and a deep connection to the land. For the past three years, she has also been part of Garden Folk CIC, a collaborative community cultivating seasonal rituals and resilience through growing, making, and celebrating. Her work revives practical knowledge and ancestral food ways through communal experience.
Copper Sounds / @coppersounds / www.coppersounds.co.uk
Running: Rhythms of the Earth
Copper Sounds are an artist duo who explore the physical and visual nature of sound. They see sound as a malleable material and have a unique way of working with and manipulating sound, through designing and making sonic objects which they play live. Their process is about experimentation and the unknown, trying things out and always thinking directly about how the object and the sound affect one another. The objects they make tell the story of their process and act as markers of their journey of transforming raw material into sound. They started out as an experimental record manufacturer; making records out of copper, volcanic rock, chalk and ceramic.
Lead Contact
St Anne’s House & Bricks
Youth Programme: Since speaking with local residents in 2021, Bricks has been responding to the need for youth provision in the St Annes area. We’ve since launched a regular weekly youth club and delivered over six holiday programmes for young people aged 13 and up.
To find out more about our youth work get in touch with Holly at holly@bricksbristol.org / 07718106953
