Celebrating all things Ukrainian at the Craft, Art & Music Studio

The opening of the Ukrainian CAM (Craft, Art & Music) Studio in Cambridge was marked by a celebration of the country’s culture and traditions.

Hosted by the Ukrainian Heritage, Art & Music Centre – Ukrainian HAM – at St Andrew’s Street Baptist Church on 19 October, it was billed as a day ‘for everyone from 4 to 104’.

Autumn-themed art and craft masterclasses included watercolour landscape painting, floral arrangements, and children designing a haunted house, grass-head toys, As well as Apple Day celebrations, there was hot, spicy cider and homemade pastries.

Pumpkins featured in two interactive displays and visitors were treated to an illustrated story about its role in world culture.

The celebrations were tinged by shocking and desperate new developments in the war in Ukraine affecting economics, property, freedom and life itself. Loneliness is another problem but a donation of SIM cards worth more than £1,000 from the WaveLength charity this autumn has helped the Ukrainian community in Cambridgeshire to keep in touch with loved ones in their home country.

And at the opening ceremony, the Cambridge-based WaveLength charity went further by presenting 11 laptops and 11 iPads for Ukrainian CAM Studio.

Tim Leech, CEO of WaveLength, said: “As the UK’s leading loneliness charity, it’s fantastic to be able to do work in our home base of Cambridge and make this donation to such a deserving cause. It’s fantastic that Ukrainian HAM will be able to make such good use of these tablets and laptops.”

The devices will be used for digital art classes for young people to help them gain experience and professional skills.

Alla Madich, a founder of Ukrainian HAM, said: “We are extremely grateful to WaveLength and to Tim and Elizabeth Leech for their valuable contribution, and perceive this step as a kind of investment in the further development of the CAM Studio project.

“We thank everyone who put a lot of effort into making this connection a reality and strengthened it with their participation.”