Design & Crafts Council Ireland held its first stakeholder meeting of 2021, on the 28th January, online. It was a great opportunity to reflect on the achievements of 2020 and to refresh the group on the project activities so far, and what else needs to be planned for.
Shauna Sweeney (DCCI Project Coordinator) explained to the group that the 2nd ITS took place on 16-17 December 2020, that it was open to the public with over 100 people registering for each day. The recording of the event is on the CRAFTS CODE website library, and overall the event and good practices presented received really positive feedback. We were delighted that so many stakeholders, in each country, were able to join the event which focused on 'how to access new markets' and was hosted by Spain.
DCCI presented the Building Crafts and Design Enterprise as its good practice. This was presented by Emer Ferran and Emmet Bosonnet, in partnership with the LEOs and the response to the GP was really positive with several partners interested in the programme and finding out more on it. It was especially effective to include the point of view of a participant, and Emmets presentation allowed all attendees to hear his experience on the programme, and what it helped him to achieve in terms of tapping into new markets and launching his products.
Nikola Tomić (DCCI EU Projects Manager) presented five other GPs from other CRAFTS CODE partners, namely the Kvarken Shop from Finland, Officina Creative and Firenze Creative from Italy, the Festival of Folk Arts from Hungary and JOYA Barcelona from Spain. He explained that these may be of interest to the group when we are looking at transferrable programmes and good examples to incorporate into our own action plan.
Shauna added that the next topic for the 3rd ITS is ‘How to improve innovation in the crafts sector’. This ITS will be hosted by DCCI in April 2021, and is a great opportunity to showcase the work DCCI and its stakeholders are focusing on in supporting the crafts sector and its makers. The group will meet again in March and April, to research and present any programmes they feel respond to the topic 'how to innovate the crafts sector' in preparation for the ITS.
