Blackhorse Creates: 17th to 20th September
If you’ve ever wondered what goes on behind the workshop doors and studio spaces around Blackhorse Lane, Blackhorse Creates will give you the opportunity to find out.
Taking place Thursday 17 to Sunday 20 September, Blackhorse Creates will bring together makers, artists, designers and creative businesses for workshops, panel talks and behind-the-scenes opportunities across the Blackhorse Collective Creative Enterprise Zone.
Check out the full programme below:
Thursday 17th:
Next Gen: Creative Employment by Blackhorse Workshop
Panel Talk – FREE
Switchboard Studios
4 – 5pm
Hear from artists, makers and businesses supporting the next generation of local creatives into creative employment. How do we ensure as a community that the skills and knowledge continue for generations to come?
Community Dinner by Pulse and Pickle
Opening Party – £ sliding scale
Pulse and Pickle (at Blackhorse Workshop)
6 – 9pm
An opening party and community meal to celebrate the weekend of activities across Blackhorse Lane and the surrounding area, food served by Pulse & Pickle.
Gather, Create, Dream Together – Pulse & Pickle
Origins: Opening Evening of Colour Lab: from waste to value, by Laura Perryman
Panel Talk – Invite only
Switchboard Studios
6:30 – 9pm
Evening event for the design innovation community: the story behind waste-derived colour, why pigments carry histories, and what changes when we make them from what already exists. Exhibition preview, panel discussion and welcome drinks.
Friday 18th:
Colour Lab: from waste to value, by Chroma Waste Lab & Colour of Saying by Laura Perryman
Exhibition – FREE
Switchboard Studios
12 – 6pm
Post-consumer textiles become new pigments, dyes, and inks. Waste; not as the end of a material’s life, but as the beginning of its next one. Discover science and design applications: what the pigment looks like, and how designers and makers could put it to work.
Colour Lab: swatching sessions, with Chroma Waste Lab & Colour of Saying by Laura Perryman
Workshop – FREE, no booking required
Switchboard Studios
1pm / 3pm / 5pm
Get hands-on with dyed experiments and ink trials, with the science and stories behind milled cotton pigment told by the researchers themselves.
For 2026 Blackhorse Creates is highlighting the route into the creative industries for the next generation of designers, makers, creative entrepreneurs. In collaboration with local partners, businesses and creatives, Blackhorse Workshop have programmed a day of youth insights.
Each organisation will open their doors for local schools, colleges and alternative provisions giving local young people a day in the life of, hands-on making experience and employment tips and tricks to ensure our creative community continues to support local people in local employment.
With thanks to Alfred Dunhill Ltd, Buttress & Snatch, Edward John Milton Studio, Gurmeet Sian of Office Sian, Laura Perryman, Colour of Saying, Mick Lapsley of Lapsley Frameworks Ltd, Shumba Maasai of Ancestral Futures, Oscar of Wildside Projects.
Saturday 19th:
Blackhorse Workshop Open Studios
Open Studios – FREE
Blackhorse Workshop
12 – 5pm
Get a ‘behind the scenes’ insight into the creative makers and businesses that operate from Blackhorse Workshop Maker Studios. From interiors to furniture, fashion to sculpture and more. Meet the makers and find out what goes on in these creative workspaces.
We Lift Each Other curated by ThisIsByron
Exhibition – FREE
Blackhorse Workshop
12 – 5pm
Exhibition showcasing the range of practices – furniture, joinery, blacksmithing, metalwork, sculpture, painting (to name a few) – that move through Blackhorse Workshop’s open access wood and metal workshops, member studios and community programmes.
Studio Horao’s Sound Installation by Marianna Glykofridi
Exhibition – FREE
Blackhorse Workshop
12 – 5pm
Interactive soundscape exploring the sounds and textures of the Blackhorse workshop environment. It considers how the workshop sounds over time, and how we may recognise the presence of others through subtle audio cues.
Routes into Making by Blackhorse Workshop
Panel Talk – FREE, no booking required
Blackhorse Workshop
12 – 1pm
Hear from Blackhorse Workshop Makers on their array of journeys into their current creative practice. What dictates a creative pathway? How might you follow a ‘non-traditional’ route into making?
Free Family Puppet Making by Blackhorse Workshop
Workshop – FREE, no booking required
Blackhorse Workshop
12 – 4pm
A free, drop-in, making session for all the family. Using cardboard and pins to create horse inspired puppets facilitated by Blackhorse Activators.
Sound of Blackhorse Creates by Talia Andrea
Party – FREE
Blackhorse Workshop
1 – 5pm
Talia Andrea, DJ, music promoter and founder of HYPERLINK has curated the sound of Blackhorse Creates. Join us for a day of multi-genre music made by local, young, artists ready to set the vibes.
Blackhorse Workshop Tours
Tour – FREE, no booking required
Blackhorse Workshop
1pm / 2:30pm / 4:30pm
Join a tour of Blackhorse Workshop, a social enterprise dedicated to making and home to over 40 creative businesses. Enjoy a look at our maker studios, machine shop, workshop and forge.
Blacksmithing Demonstrations
Exhibition – FREE, no booking required
Blackhorse Workshop
1pm / 2pm / 3pm
Discover the heritage craft of blacksmithing in the Blackhorse Workshop Open Access Forge, with Blacksmith Isabella Busoni.
Blackhorse Responders 2026
Exhibition – FREE
Pulse and Pickle
12 – 5pm
Since April 2026 Blackhorse Responders, a group of young people aged 16-25 years old have been designing, making and curating a month-long exhibition exploring creative activism. You’ll see insights into their ever-evolving sculptures and manifestos on the walls of Pulse and Pickle.
Insta: @blackhorse.responders
Family Make Stuff Club Morning: Puppets by Blackhorse Workshop
Workshop – £35 per family
Blackhorse Workshop
10am – 12pm
Design and make your very own puppets using wood and bolts to make a moving masterpiece! Suitable for beginners and open to parents and guardians with a child 7+ years old. Booking required.
Queer Metal Club
Workshop – £40
Blackhorse Workshop
1 – 4pm
Let’s Get Bent! A special edition of Queer Metal Club – by and for queers who are curious about metalwork. Use plasma cutting and welding to make your own candelabra! Booking required.
Family Make Stuff Club Afternoon: Puppets
Workshop – £35 per family
Blackhorse Workshop
2 – 4pm
Design and make your very own puppets using wood and bolts to make a moving masterpiece! Suitable for beginners and open to parents and guardians with a child 7+ years old. Booking required.
Nicola Morrison Residency – Open Day
Exhibition – FREE
Artworks Project Space, Barbican Arts Group Trust
12 – 4pm
Come and see artist Nicola Morrison at work and discover what she has been working on as part of her residency, featuring paintings which explore nature as an integral part of the city.
Insta: @nicola_morrison_art
Walthamstow Tool Library
Open Library – FREE, no booking required
2 Priory Court, E17 5LS
10am – 1pm
Walthamstow Tool Library (WTL) is a tool lending library with the mission to make tools both accessible and affordable, while reducing the need to purchase new tools and the environment impact.
Colour Lab: from waste to value by Chroma Waste Lab x Colour of Saying by Laura Perryman
Exhibition – FREE
Switchboard Studios
12-6pm
Post-consumer textiles become new pigments, dyes, and inks. Waste; not as the end of a material’s life, but as the beginning of its next one. Discover science and design applications: what the pigment looks like, and how designers and makers could put it to work.
CMF Future Palettes by Laura Perryman
Workshop – £50 per person
Switchboard Studios
12:30 – 2:30pm
How can pre-owned colour inspire design futures? Working with waste-derived pigments and CMF (Colour, Material & Finish) samples, build a “moodworld”: an atmospheric future palette speculating on where colour could go next. Booking essential, concessions available.
Collider by Signal to Noise
Exhibition – FREE
Big Penny Social
1 – 4pm
Discover this interactive sound experience, blending music creation with tactile digital interactions. Experience the interplay between the real and the virtual and explore sound and space in a deeply immersive way.
Insta @signaltonoise
Fantastical Drawings to Solve Things: An all-ages brainstorming workshop
Workshop – FREE, no need to book
Big Penny Social
2 – 4pm
Artist Barry Sykes will lead you through a fast and fun workshop as we use the power of drawing to invent surprising solutions for people’s everyday problems.
Visit Barry Sykes’ page
Lungs of London with Jasleen Kaur, Demi Henderson and Alexis McAttee
Workshop – FREE
Big Penny Social
1 – 4pm
Historically in town planning, green spaces were imagined as the ‘lungs of London’ creating spaces to breath and belong in the city. Using concrete poetry, create song lyrics about how the city, the neighbourhood, the park and the pavement makes you feel.
Visit Jasleen Kaur’s page
Making with Blackhorse Activators
Workshop – FREE
Big Penny Social
1 – 4pm
Join our youth alumni group of Blackhorse Activators to take part in an array of creative, activism inspired making activities inspired by their Acme Studios Exhibition.
Insta @blackhorse.responders
Wildside Garden Party
Community Party – FREE
Wildside Garden Project
5 – 8pm
Join the Wildside Community Garden for an evening of music, food and drinks to celebrate the local creative community and Blackhorse Creates. The event is free but donations for chicken care costs are welcome.
Visit Wideside Projects’ page
Sunday 20th:
Industrial heritage surrounded by nature: a guided walk
Walk – FREE but booking required
Walthamstow Wetlands
10:30 – 12pm / 2 – 3:30pm
Discover a piece of London’s industrial past, surrounded by nature. Join us at the wetlands for a special tour of the Victorian Engine House. Climb the steps of the old Coppermill Tower, first mentioned in the Domesday Book. Book via Open House.
Photobatik with Ummi Hoque
Workshop – FREE, no booking required
Turbine Room, Walthamstow Wetlands
12 – 3:30pm
Join Ummi Hoque, a Blackhorse Activator, to explore this creative photographic technique. Using a resist face moisturiser to protect parts of the paper from developing chemicals you’ll create unique textures and patterns in your prints inspired by nature.
A Year in Colour – Autumn In-Nature Colour Experience
Workshop – £65 per person
London Flower Farmer, Coppermill Lane
4 – 7pm
Botanical foraging session at a local flower farm. How does nature’s colour shift through the seasons and how might a place-based practice shape future palettes? With Laura Perryman and Amber Fry at The London Flower Farmer, Coppermill Lane. (Booking required, community tickets available).
A Design District of London Design Festival 2026 and part of Open House Festival, the event celebrates the creative work happening on our doorstep – and invites everyone to get involved.
Blackhorse Creates is delivered by Blackhorse Workshop, a social enterprise dedicated to making, and Blackhorse Collective, Waltham Forest’s Creative Enterprise Zone, one of 12 zones designated by the Mayor of London.
A big thank you to Stow Brothers for their support on Blackhorse Creates.