Our adult community education centres offer a range of courses and workshops to help you repurpose, reuse and recycle while learning a new creative skill.

Bondholder Purely Digital has taken part in The Big Climate Fightback, a campaign organised by the Woodland Trust, as part of its commitment to reduce its impact on the environment.

Alongside BBC Countryfile presenter Julia Bradbury, owner Andrew Edmondson took part in a day in Mead near Heanor - an area planned to be the first Young People’s Forest - planting 150 trees; the amount it is said that everyone on the planet would need to plant to reverse the damage of carbon emissions over the past 10 years.

‘Spread more neighbourly cheer’ is the latest message from local friendship group, Derbyshire Peak Oddfellows, as it shares its top five tips to keep community spirits high this festive season.

The advice comes on the back of Campaign to End Loneliness’ Be More Us initiative, which reports that almost half of UK adults say that their busy lives prevent them from connecting with other people.

Matthew Hutchings has celebrated his first anniversary as Managing Director of The Derby Conference Centre - one of the leading events and conference venues in the East Midlands. His first year in charge has marked some big changes at the Conference Centre, with Hutchings’ leadership taking the venue from strength to strength.

A Derby charity fundraiser has successfully completed his ultimate challenge to raise money for local charity Safe and Sound’s Butterfly Appeal.

Simon Barcz from Oakwood has raised more than £4,500 on top of the thousands he has already secured for Derby-based Safe and Sound which specialises in grassroots work across the county to transform the lives of children and young people who are victims of or at risk of child sexual exploitation (CSE).

Acclaimed artist David Manley has donated one of his land and seascape-inspired paintings for a silent auction to support the community engagement programme at Déda – the city-based organisation that aims to enrich people’s lives through dance and the arts.

The 15” by 12” painting entitled ‘Cape Poem’ was recently on display as part of the ‘A Riotous Assembly’ exhibition at Déda in Chapel Street and would usually sell for around £120.

Normanton Library which is to be based at St Augustine’s Community Centre opens on 27 November 2019. There will be a series of opening events spread over four days to showcase what the new library can offer.

Authors, storytellers and face painters as well as an exciting ‘CSI Whodunit Event’ where people can join the fun and solve the burglary in the library using forensic science are all on the line-up.

Super-Powering Girls and their Grannies

We are excited to announce that we have received almost £60,000 from Arts Council England and the Lottery’s AWA fund to mount a ground-breaking new aerial theatre show for families. Aidy the Awesome is an aerial theatre show about 8 year-old Aidy who discovers she is a superhero after her grandmother tells her a secret- all women in their family have super powers.

It is been a busy month I've had some amazing commissions and sales and I'm loving how my work has been framed by my client. It has really made me rethink my own framing choices.
As artists, we have to be neutral and cater to all tastes but the treatment of my Ilkeston piece pictured really impressed me.

The ITAC Collaborative, the first international network for the participatory arts, has now launched a new purpose-built website. The site www.itac-collaborative.com has been designed in response to a consultation with more than 300 teaching artists from 28 countries, conducted during ITAC’s most recent international conference - ITAC4 at Carnegie Hall (2018) in NYC, USA.