Arts and crafts (Galleries/Exhinitions)
There are many small galleries showing work by a single artist or a number of artists together. There are also craft shops around the Lake District selling glass, pottery, candles and so on. Some galleries combine both arts and crafts.
Blackwell Arts and Crafts House
The Blackwell Arts and Crafts House in Windermere, www.blackwell.org.uk, is a fine example of the Arts and Crafts Movement in architecture, showing elegance and a sense of space. Arts and Crafts antiques and furniture are on display. It has changing exhibitions, lectures and events.
Beatrix Potter
The World of Beatrix Potter in Windermere, the Beatrix Potter Gallery at Hawkshead and Hilltop, her picture postcard cottage in Near Sawrey, all have examples of Beatrix Potter’s artwork and watercolours, many of which were published in her children’s books.
Pinfold Gallery
The Pinfold Gallery is a showcase for original fine art, contemporary designer crafts, especially glass, and jewellery, with the emphasis on quality and originality. It is situated at Lake Road, Bowness on Windermere.
Heaton Cooper Gallery
Heaton Cooper Gallery, Grasmere, has a large collection of colour reproductions of the Lake District by William Heaton Cooper [1903-1995] and his father Alfred Heaton Cooper [1863-1929. Find a changing exhibition of watercolours, prints, greeting cards, books, sculpture and paintings and a selection of art materials.
Slapestones Gallery
Slapestones Gallery, Grasmere, has a varied selection of watercolours paintings and prints from local artists and Lake District landscapes.
Sculpture Park
Grizedale Forest is situated between Coniston Water and Esthwaite Water. It has been a ‘sculpture park’ since 1977 when artists started to produce outdoor sculpture in the forest. There are now more than 90 items including a huge ‘man of the forest’.
Abbot Hall
Abbot Hall in Kendal is an 18th century country house built on an earlier site. It is now an art gallery with changing exhibitions and a collection of paintings by George Romney (1734-1802) and some by John Ruskin. The Museum of Lakeland Life faces it across a courtyard.
Quaker Tapestry Exhibition
In the Friends Meeting House, Kendal, the Quaker Tapestry Exhibition tells the Quaker story from the 17th-Century to today. It is illustrated by 77 panels of embroidery; the work of more than 4,000 people from 15 countries. Quaker costumes are also on display with embroidery demonstrations and a Gift Shop.
Sizergh Castle
Sizergh Castle, south of Kendal, was the Elizabethan home to the Strickland family for over 700 years. It has a good collection of antiques, portraits and furniture.
Keswick Museum and Art Gallery
Keswick Museum and Art Gallery shows the history of Keswick to a modern tourist town and some of its famous residents. It contains original manuscripts of the lake poets, a 500 year old cat, Flintoft’s model of the Lake District, the musical stones and the collection of crystals.
Thornthwaite Galleries
Thornthwaite Galleries show contemporary art in the village of Thornthwaite, near Keswick. The gallery now has the work of over 130 exhibitors, many from the North West. I t also offers light refreshments with exclusively Fairtrade coffee, tea and chocolate.
http://www.thornthwaitegalleries.co.uk
Beckstones Art Gallery
Beckstones Art Gallery, near Greystoke on the edge of the National Park, stocks work by many of today’s fine Lakeland landscape painters and still life artists.
http://www.beckstonesartgallery.co.uk
Percy House Gallery
The Percy House Gallery in Cockermouth is housed in a building that dates from 1390. The arts and crafts on display include jewellery, textiles, glassware, ceramics, metalwork, paintings, sculpture and photographs.