It's been a great first year: Creativity Found podcast

It's hard to believe that creativityfound.co.uk only officially launched in January of this year (2022). So much has been happening, and this part of the Creativity Found package is now so ingrained in my everyday life, I can't image my life before it, or without it.

For the final post in this series of self-congratulatory blog posts 😂 I'll be looking at the 2022 highlights for the Creativity Found podcast.

Guests

I have released 30 episodes in 2022, and just like 2021 have met the most fun, friendly, fabulous people with inspirational stories to tell of of finding or re-finding a creative outlet as adults.

It's been a popular year for writers, from fiction to satire, children's books and poetry. Have you listened yet to

• Julie Carrick Dalton – author of Waiting for the Night Song and The Last Beekeeper
• Anna Lussenburg – whose rhyming satirical stories draw on the ridiculousness of some of our political situations
• Tetyana Denford – Ukranian-American author of novel The Child of Ukraine and a number of collected writings
• Anupa Roper - whose children's book Sparrowlegs is all about empowering the young to feel happy in their skin and to accept others in theirs
• Andrea Carter Brown – who fled her Manhattan apartment on 9/11 and, after a painful journey, published her poetry collection about her life before, during and after that event, entitled September 12, in 2021.
• Fiona Myles – whose life from adoption to homeless youngster living in a world of drugs, alcohol and prostitution – and how she rebuilt her life – is chronicled in her books This is Me and Adopted.

Then there are the painters, from

• Sally Ward – a civil servant who rediscovered art, from watercolours to her beloved oil paints, and was a finalist on Sky's Portrait Artist of the Year.
• Jennifer Baker – started painting atmospheric abstracts when her translation work disappeared during Covid, and has never looked back.
• Annie Sloan – the queen of decorative painting, inventor of Chalk Paint, author of The Complete Book of Decorative Paint Techniques and many more color and paint books, and champion of independent business and letting everyone know that anyone can paint.

And a wonderfully eclectic mix including

• Juliet Sargeant – double Chelsea Flower Show award winner, regular Gardeners' Question Time panellist, founder of Sussex Garden School and former doctor.
• Laura Boswell – a hugely influential printmaker and author of books Linocut and Reduction Printmaking and Making Japanese Woodblock Prints, who has studied in Japan more than once, but only after a printing press was 'forced' upon her after she tried to resist the gift.
• Emma Brassfield – a YouTube sewing sensation who has also worked in creature fabrication on films such as Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban and Star Wars The Force Awakens.
• Jo Watson – who has worked in schools and sports education in colleges, prisons and the Caribbean, but more recently likes to get creative with her words.  
• Ella Orr – who became disheartened in her role as an educator and took a whole new direction after her mother passed away.
• Mary Broddle – a high-flying corporate engineer whose ill health meant she had to slow right down, and discover that embroidery can help with that.

And more besides, including bonus episodes from Create a Scene members, which you can read about here.

Click on the orange links above to tune into the episode in question, or head over to your favourite podcast app here. 

Events

But I don't only sit at my desk talking to people through a screen, I also get out a bit, spreading the word about this podcast so more people can find it, and love it.

This year

• As holder of an International Women in Podcasting Award, I was invited by Shure to record an episode of the podcast in their pop-up studio at the Podcast Show London, where I also met up with podcast buddies from The Skylark Collective and schmoozed with other podcasters.
• I mosied on up to New Broadcasting House to be interviewed for BBC Radio 4 Extra's Podcast Radio Hour Show.
• I attended the 2022 International Women's Podcast Awards, for which Creativity Found was a finalist.
• I attended the 2022 Digital Women Awards, where the podcast and the Creativity Found community were both finalists.
• I attended the Content is Queen International Women's Podcast Festival, where I met fabulous new podcast contacts and learnt from the panel talks. 
• I met some familiar and new podcast pals at the nominations announcement night for the British Podcast Awards.
• I was invited by Edie Lush of the Global Goalscast show, and the Media Circle in collaboration with The Press Club to present two masterclasses on starting a podcast.

Podcast in the press and the featured lists

Always keen to spread the word, I have promoted the podcast in various media

• Love Embroidery magazine love what I do with the podcast and the community, and featured us.
• Pod Bible listed Creativity Found as an indie favourite, and later in the year wrote a whole article on the show.
• In the US the podcast was in the top ten of Inspiring Indies according to Amazon.
• As part of the Business Podcast Awards, Creativity Found was in the top 20 of listener choice finalists.
• At the time of writing yet to be published, I have also been interviewed for Simply Sewing magazine and Podpod.com.

Next year

I'm not going anywhere. Episodes for January and February are already recorded and just(!) need editing, while pre-chats and recording dates are in the diary right up until June already. Expect to hear from abstract and comic-book artists, jewellers, singers, musicians and more. 

Thank you

I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone for listening. Please keep listening, and tell your friends all about the show too.

Many thanks

Claire

Creativity Found Collective

The Creativity Found Collective is a membership for artists and crafters who share their creative skills with grown-ups through workshops, online courses, products or subscriptions. It is also a membership for business-support enterprises who use their expertise to help those artists and crafters to grow their businesses.

We promote their offerings on the website and connect them with a network of like-minded business owners. 

All of this is backed up by the Creativity Found podcast, in which I chat with grown-ups who have found or re-found their creativity later in life.

You can find out more about the Creativity Found Collective membership here.

And don't forget, you can subscribe to the mailing list here.