It's true, we are having a pre-show party and opening for the curated group show Home and Away (and In-Between) - curated by the lovely Tara Bursey - this coming Friday.

Friday, December 4th. 7-11pm
Exhibition runs December 3-13, 2009
Cream Tangerine Café
At the Great Hall
1087 Queen Street West, Toronto

Read More on our blog, cruise to the webpage or check it out on facebook.

All Citizens Postcards photo(s) by Serena McCarroll

Come one, come all and hear ye, hear ye:

As we draw nearer to the big, big day, our installations page has finally come alive on the website. Shoved full of valuable and dazzling information amassed and compiled by our installation curatrix (too cute?), Tara Bursey, it is a veritable treasure trove of large scale craft/art goodness.

And if that were not enough, you can also check our the installation features on our blog for Tara's in-depth profiles of individual artists and their work(s).

Keep your eyes peeled, crafty citizens; The streets around the Theatre Centre will start to be dotted with City of Craft Installations as early as next week!

Handmade homesteader, or lonestar craft cowboy, you’re on call to join us on the radical-craft frontier to build this City!

We need people to help out with set up, tear down, vendor assistance, installations & workshops, among many other things. Volunteers are essential to raisin' this barn!

Mosey over to our blog for full details.

The votes are in and it's official: our 2009 Swag Bag Design contest winner is: Shannon Lea Adolph.

Check out her Toronto skyline-inspired design - so clever & cute!


Shannon is a Montreal-based crafter who makes adorable art pillows and dolls screenprinted with her illustrations. They are available through her etsy shop, cou cou salut.

Shannon's winning design will be printed (in colour) on cotton totes, stuffed with crafty goodies, and available to the first 100 attendees of City of Craft.

2008 design by Shannon Gerard, printed by Studio XIX

Those of you who meant to enter the contest but saw the deadline come and go, take heart. We're giving you an extra chunk of time to get your original designs that reflect a unique, handmade aesthetic out of your head and into our inbox!

If your design is chosen, it will be printed on cotton totes which will be handed out to the first lucky 100 attendees of City of Craft 2009 filled with fantastic goodies from local and international craft artists and indie publications. People line up before we open our doors in the freezing cold to receive them, so we want to give them something special this year to take home.

The winner will be rewarded handsomely with crafty prizes* and fame via our website, blog & other press outlets.

Designs should be no more than 8.5 by 11 inches at a high resolution. We accept jpegs and pdfs. If you aren't sure what sort of line thickness is needed for silkscreening or you have any other questions just let us know.

If you think you have the winning design, let us know by sending your submission to swagbag@cityofcraft.com by November 10th.

Good luck!

*Prizes = badges from Lee Meszaros, ceramic shot glasses from Krystal Speck, an amazing class gift card from The Workroom (at a value of $50), a button set from and diptych print from Sweetie Pie Press and a pair of mittlets from Anna Zygowski.

Head over The Gladstone to check out Canzine and our General Store themed City of Craft room!

This year, City of Craft is teaming up with the good folks at Broken Pencil Magazine to bring a brand new 'art room' to their annual celebration of indie culture, Hotel Canzine. Our room, The City of Craft General Store, will be a one-day jam-packed old-timey shop to delight all your crafty senses.

Sunday, November 1, 2009
1pm - 7pm
The Gladstone Hotel
1214 Queen St. West (Queen just East of Dufferin)
Toronto
$5 admission comes with a free copy of the Fall issue of Broken Pencil Magazine

The City of Craft General Store features selected works from...

Bespoke Uprising
Bettula
Tara Bursey
Damned Dollies
Shannon Gerrard
Lee Meszaros
Misanthrope Specialty Co.
Mr. Skona
Nightjar Books
The Pinpals
Resurrection Fern
The Sweetie Pie Press

Visit webpage for details.