Chair Report 2021

Woven AGM 2020/21
Woven Chairpersons Report
July 1st 2021

Dear Woven Members,
What a pleasure to present the first ever Woven Chairperson’s report! 
It’s been just over a year and a half since the idea of Woven was first conceived and what a
year and a half it has been!! From what started as a conversation between 2 friends on the
beach in Jan 2020, Woven has now evolved into an incorporated non-profit organisation with a
strong committee of talented and passionate women and a membership base of 240 persons.
Woven had aimed to launch in the first half of last year however due to Covid, we were set
back quite a few months. Shortly after formally incorporating in May of 2020, we made a
presentation to the Lions Club of Cowaramup who generously granted us $5000 seed funding.
Woven officially launched in September 2020 with a very successful event attracting over 150
women. At the same time we launched a website with an ecommerce platform enabling online
bookings and payments. We also began our online media presence on Facebook and
Instagram with the aim to inform our community of our activities and also creatively inspire and
attract new members.
We currently operate most of our offerings out of the Cowaramup District Social Club, with a
long-term goal to have our own purpose built space for fulfilling our vision, which extends well
beyond Arts and Crafts.
Our initial proposed offerings of monthly Thursday night workshops, quickly became bi-
monthly to accommodate high member numbers. The workshops kicked off in October 2020
with both booking out with 45 ladies attending each one.
We have since found a nice balance of around 20 people per session with 2 volunteer
facilitators. We feel this number works well as the background noise of the CDSC can be
distracting and a more intimate group is more conducive for promoting connection and offering
the relaxed, casual and nurturing environment that Woven is all about.
Our weekly Monday studio sessions attract women of all ages, with and without children. Up
until the 2020 summer holidays we were having consistent numbers of around 12 women plus
children. These sessions offer a very relaxed vibe and there has been some really lovely
connections and friendships made through this offering.
While numbers were lower over the summer months we are now seeing them pick up again
and we feel they will continue to increase as word gets out.
Over the summer we held monthly pop-up pottery sessions, which proved to be very popular.
The pop-up craft concept is one which we are actively exploring for the coming year and will
aim to include a diverse range of professional artists facilitating workshops at varied time-slots
and price points. 
The pop-up Mums and Cubs sessions held in the school holidays were also very popular and
as a result we will be holding crafty sessions for the kids regularly in school holidays.
In December 2020 we were successful obtaining a grant from the AMR Shire to the value of
$11866 which included a significant budget for non disposable resources and also generous
funds to put on 4 x Local Art Exhibition Evenings in 2021.

With the non-disposable resource budget we have been able to acquire some valuable assets
for Woven including lockable storage cupboards, general crafting equipment like scissors and
brushes, easels, sewing machines, overlockers and a sound system.
Due to time constraints, we will only run 2 of the Local Art exhibitions this year. The first of
these was held in May at the CDSC with local artist Asha-Lily exhibiting her inspiring body of
work. Another local artist Keira Jas played live music and later on in the evening we had DJ
Saramony play. It was another vibrant event with over 150 in attendance. We had
overwhelming support from a huge number of local businesses donating prizes for a raffle on
the night raising $1500. This money will go towards the planning and realisation of the Woven
vision of having our own purpose-built space.
 
Our 2nd Community Art Exhibition will be held in October and will be more of a collaborative
exhibition, showcasing the ‘Ocean themed’ works of over 50 talented local creatives. 
The balance of the funds for these events has been approved by the Shire to be re-directed to
purchase lighting and art hanging equipment for future community exhibition events, which we
will continue to hold bi-annually into the future.
Woven moving forward...
We recently surveyed our members for feedback about their Woven experience so far. The
information collected has been valuable, and in response we will be implementing a few
changes in the coming months including session time changes and a greater diversity of
offerings including wellbeing focussed offerings and others aiming to promote community
strengthening.
In August we will be hosting the running of an 8-week Shire funded Youth Program, which we
hope to be the first of many of its kind moving forward.
In September we will be holding a Women’s Wellbeing month. In addition to our regular
Thursday night workshops, we will be offering focussed Women’s health evenings and also
hosting a screening of the documentary ‘Birthtime’ at the CDSC.
A huge thank you to the Cowaramup Lions who have been a huge financial supporter of
Woven granting us another $5000 for the 2021/22 financial year to cover our operating
expenses. This is an amazing contribution and we are so grateful to have such a strong Lions
club in our community who are invested in supporting local grass roots community groups.
A very special thank you must go to the Woven committee for the countless hours of time and
effort that they put in to bring Woven to life. Over the year we have had a few committee
members retire and others step in to take their place and we are grateful for every one of them
for their individual contribution. Also a big thanks goes to all of the amazing volunteer
facilitators and other helpers who have been so wonderful in sharing their crafts and inspiring
us all with their talents.
Finally to our members, thank you for being part of this movement. We hope you enjoy
evolving with us and believing in the greater Woven vision. Exciting times ahead for both our
strengthening and growth as we move into year 2 of our existence.
With Warm Regards,
Alice Boyd
Woven Chairperson 2020/21