Rural Training Centre

Involvement of the RTC in the May On Our Doorstep project

The Rural Training Centre is run by the HSE. It is part of the Mayo Mental Health Services and offers Rehabilitation work to people with mental health difficulties. Part of an individual’s timetable can include craft classes, art as well as taking part in the outdoor Nursery and Organic Garden activities. Community projects are greatly appreciated by everyone at the centre as the service users enjoy so much the change of venues and social aspects of such work.

The May On Our Doorstep project was one of the nicest projects we have been asked to contribute to. Everyone involved in the making would be a gardener as well as skilled in handling cloth/paint and floristry materials. So it was easy to inspire the group. The materials chosen were beautiful, including old botanical watercolour paintings of flowers. We agreed our contribution would be ‘wild flowers’ as those were the flowers we had seen or gathered in our childhood for May Day.

Some of the surfaces of the blooms are in their own way ‘gardened’ – using vintage materials and embellishments. Others are big and bold – some using crochet, a skill learned a few weeks earlier in a workshop at the centre.

Aoife’s visits and her May Day traditions talk given around the exhibits at the museum greatly inspired the group. They really enjoyed her enthusiastic appreciation of their work and her great care in documenting it with fantastic photographs. Those photographs will later be added to their personal Art Book.

To have work displayed within the museum was indeed a thrill and the group look forward with great excitement to seeing their work alongside everyone else’s efforts.

No Comments

Start the ball rolling by posting a comment on this page!

Add a comment about this page

Your email address will not be published.