Tonbridge Creative is a local art group formed when a number of us started meeting in a local pub. This was motivated by an understanding that there is a good deal of quality work being produced in Tonbridge and the surrounding area and nowhere to exhibit it locally.
Jugs in the window
We have run the ArtSpring exhibition at Tonbridge School for the past three years. This year the opportunity arose to take a shop in the popular Pantiles area of our neighbouring and better known town of Tunbridge Wells for a couple of weeks at short notice.
A flurry of emails and ad-hoc meetings and the word went round that we would be setting up last Monday and sure enough 16 people turned up and managed to get a display organised. I wasn’t much involved, so much credit to Anne Molineux, Hildegard Pax and Julie Taylor.
I was there stewarding today and will be for the next couple of days. I’m not taking part next week as I have another event the following weekend and felt over committed. Wandering around the show today it was a fantastic collection of work.
Sales so far have been a little slow. A couple of my pieces did sell today. Especially as today was the dreaded ‘Black Friday’ I thought there might be a few more people out on their lunch break. However the weather was drizzly, so perhaps the weekend will be busier.
If you can’t get along to Tunbridge Wells this weekend then the Tonbridge and Hadlow South East Open Studios group is having a Christmas event on December 5th/6th in Hadlow, and I’ll be there with a different selection of work.
Mike's Pad 
Best of luck to your group. This seems to be a bit of a theme as Rosiescribbler and friends have been doing similar things in Swansea. Hopefully Christmas coming might inspire the shoppers.
Thank you. I’ve just taken my work away, although the shop is continuing for one more week with a couple of other people coming in. In the end sales went well for me. I’ve easily covered costs and I think that after all the sums are done it will have been worthwhile for me. Good luck to those continuing this week. Meanwhile I need to unload the car and repack all the boxes for next weekend’s Open Studios.