About The Guild

 

The Makers Guild in Wales is a national applied art and craft membership organisation based in Cardiff, Wales. The organisation exists to engage and inspire audiences as a centre of excellence for Craft and Applied Art, and to champion Welsh Craft Makers.  Our award winning gallery, Craft in the Bay is located on the “Flourish” in Cardiff Bay,  opposite Wales Millennium Centre and close to the iconic Senedd Building.  Our gallery is the regional hub for Craft and Applied Art in the Capital of Wales. Our gallery houses exhibitions of work by our membership of Welsh craft makers alongside a curated programme of the finest National and International craft and applied art. We have developed highly-regarded programme of community craft workshops

The Guild began as a maker co-operative in 1984 and still retains it's co-operative ethos today, as a social enterprise our organisation is unique in Wales.

The Guild has been used as an exemplar study into co-operative consortia by the Wales Co-operative Centre. Our Heritage building is also Award winning, being short-listed for a RIBA award and receiving a 'highly commended' at the British Archaeology Award in 2004 .

Our core purpose is to Inspire, Support and Celebrate.

  •  Inspiring craft engagement - The Guild inspires engagement and learning about contemporary craft, by providing opportunities for audiences and artists to experience contemporary applied art and craft in Wales.
  • Supporting Welsh craft makers - The Guild is a membership organisation of Welsh craft-makers who all share in the Guilds strong co-operative ethos.
  • Celebrating craft excellence - Championing high quality hand-made crafts and applied art in Wales both of its members work and of invited National and International Artists and Makers.

We have been successfully managing to sustain and maintain our Charitable Objectives for over 36 years:

'The Objects are to advance education for the public benefit in the visual Arts and Crafts in particular but not exclusively by exhibitions of high quality handmade crafts and the provision of workshop programmes'