Creativity Found: Finding Creativity Later in Life

Why being an artist DOESN'T mean you have to do it full time Career-wise, Sally Ward balances her roles as a civil servant and as a portrait artist, and finds fulfilment, enjoyment and challenges in each. She was a prolific artist as a youngster, and was allowed by her secondary school to go to the local sixth-form college to take life-drawing classes at the age of 14. She was very interested...

For this short and sweet bonus episode (while I'm on summer hols) I caught up with Gerry Coles (episode 3) to find out what's new in her world of linocut printmaking. If you found value in this episode and would like to show your appreciation, consider supporting the podcast through the Support the Show link, or by sending a boostagram , for example in the Fountain app . CreativityFound....

In this short and sweet bonus episode (while I'm on summer hols) I caught up with Cass Sabo (episodes 3 and 22) to find out what's new in her world of weaving. If you found value in this episode and would like to show your appreciation, consider supporting the podcast through the Support the Show link, or by sending a boostagram , for example in the Fountain app . CreativityFound.co.uk O...

Ella Orr’s parents came to the UK from Mauritius in the 1960s and, understandably, they wanted Ella to do well academically. But they also wanted her and her sister to have a wider outlook and sent them to dancing and music lessons, which Ella loved, so much so that she choose to do a creative arts degree. But once thoughts turned to earning a living, musical theatre didn’t seem like a lucrative o...

Fiona Myles grew up in a small town in Scotland, always aware that she was different from her siblings because she was adopted. As a teenager, she became increasingly isolated and began to rebel. She moved to London to work as a nanny, but quickly got caught up in a world of drugs and alcohol, ending up homeless and sleeping rough in Victoria Station.  She even had a brush with death when she trie...

Aged 18 Jennifer Baker packed her bags and moved from Florida to New York City to study at the School of Visual Arts, one of the best art schools in the US. It was the 1980s and she says that the school and the experience moulded her as an artist and as a person, but she couldn’t live there forever.  After graduating Jennifer had no clue of how to make art her profession, although she did try. She...

Jo Watson fell into teaching after being told she wasn’t clever enough to study law and that to get into journalism she needed a different degree to the one she had. She loved her first - year placement, and did really well, but at her second school her experience was not so good. She was stifled in her teaching freedom and because of that lost her enthusiasm for the job. When she left that school...

Have you ever wondered how I find my creativity? Probably not, but let's just say that podcasting has been a revelation to me, and gives me loads of creative 'feels'. So when I was invited to the Podcast Show in London to record in a pop-up studio on the Shure stand, I decided I would use the opportunity to discuss the creativity of podcasting, and invited along fellow podcaster, an...

Mary Broddle wanted to be an engineer from the age of 5, and has had a very successful career in mechanical engineering – in a typically male-dominated environment. She worked hard and really enjoyed her work in the corporate sphere, but in the background her health was deteriorating, until eventually she had to make the difficult decision to quit it all and focus on her physical, emotional and me...

Anna Lovind learned to read and write when she was very young, and used writing as a survival mechanism for a while, helping her through, although not understand, things that were happening to her in her young life. It was much later that she realized that writing could be an enjoyable form of expression and a way to explore her voice. Because of past traumas she had to rebuild her life before she...

How to learn a vintage embroidery technique If you are inspired by my guests' stories of finding their creative passions as adults, and want to tap onto your own creativity, then I'm here to help, with the Creativity Found directory of arts and crafts workshops, courses and kits. For this episode I am so excited to be able to introduce you to Natalie Smart and Bargello a GoGo. Natalie fe...

Anna Lussenburg’s boarding school was sometimes unusual, for example when the staff purposefully put out NOT enough breakfast places for the amount of students, and while Anna wasn’t a shining star academically, she did enjoy literature, and relished being able to study the works of Shakespeare. She had a love of words, something which is apparent in the creative activity she has embraced in more...

Juliet Sargeant was an academic child who loved the sciences, and at a young age decided she wanted to be a doctor, and in particular a psychiatrist. She successfully studied and practised medicine, and was on the cusp of specializing, when she took a break to try something different, just for a few years. So how is it that nowadays you can hear her giving advice on the BBC Radio show Gardener’s Q...

Tetyana Denford is a Ukranian-American author who lived for some years in the UK. Becoming a mother meant that writing was put to the back of the queue of things she should be doing, but a dinner-time planning chat with her husband sent Tetyana on a soul search about her future life and future self. CreativityFound.co.uk Instagram: @creativityfoundpodcast Facebook: @creativityfoundpodcast and Crea...

If you are a printmaker apparently you will be very surprised to learn that Laura Boswell turned down the offer of a free Albion printing press. ‘How stupid she was’ (her words, not mine). Although the press did still make it into her possession and encouraged (forced?!) her into revisiting an artform she had embraced at university. Laura’s artistic journey from that point onward is literal and me...

Working in the creature fabrication department on  films such as Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban and Star Wars The Force Awakens is great fun, but full-on, with long hours that meant Emma Brassfield had very limited time to spend with her young children. Things needed to change, but Emma didn’t want to lose her passion for sewing and making. She made a success of making hand-sewn children...

Anupa Roper has always been on the smaller side, and from a young age experienced shaming just for being a skinny person. ⁠ While grown-up Anupa was busy being a teacher and raising a family, she knew she wanted to help young people to NOT feel bad about their bodies. ⁠ Writing Sparrowlegs was not how she initially envisaged doing that, but as we hear all the time on this podcast, the path is rare...

As much as she loved art at school, Sam Kimberle wasn’t the ‘art kid’. The material she most liked to work with was considered a craft material with no fine art usage, and so not valued within her art education. Sam was a good academic student and studied Easter n philosophy and then law, and worked as a lawyer for a number of years. Inspired by the Don’t Keep Your Day Job podcast, Sam did leave h...

Ever since being awarded the coveted Creative Shield in Year 6 of middle school, Laura Reed was considered the ‘arty’ one in the family, and was lucky enough to have a good arts experience at secondary school too. Next came her art foundation course, which took her creative explorations in a different direction than she had originally envisaged.  The ebb and flow of going where life takes you cont...

This episode's guest, US author Julie Carrick Dalton, made an impulsive purchase a few years ago. Some people panic buy a pair of shoes or the latest electronic gadget, Julie panic-bought a forest, complete with bears and moose. Julie started her undergraduate studies as pre-med, but finished majoring in journalism, and went on to have a well-travelled life with a varied journalistic career....

As a young boy in Bermuda, Adam Roe was fascinated by hurricanes and storm chasing. He choose to study geography at uni, hoping it would be less inside and studying and more outdoors and doing, which to a degree it was. There was also a lot of music in his life at that time, as a member of Southampton’s most organised band – very rock-and-roll – but music ISN’T where Adam’s creativity lies today. ...

For this episode I’m speaking with Rabiah Coon, who gave herself a mission to do one particular, quite scary thing before she was 40. It was originally a one-time ambition but, thankfully, Rabiah has continued with her new creative release, even after moving from the US to the UK right before a global pandemic hit. Rabiah enjoyed writing as a child, and took some courses at college, but was scared...

Lynsey Warren is the owner and creator at Raindrop Crafts, as well as a handmade business coach and virtual craft fair organiser. As a youngster Lynsey loved art class at school, and doing craft activities at home, but she decided not to complete her Art A-Level and settled into a routine of office working. Lynsey continued to dabble with crafting, from cross-stitch to making her own cards, but it...

Nature photography, music photography, wedding photography, marketing, coaching, this episode's guest was not afraid to try new things and see where they would take her. Doing too much, however, can leave you feeling rudderless, and in Amber Leach's case almost. led to her giving up her creative enterprise all together. This is where a volunteering opportunity came up and changed everyth...

At uni, studying sociology, Kat Arksey visited poetry reading club nights. She was writing her own poetry, but kept her creations to herself, not feeling confident enough to share her works. Kat has now published a number of poetic writings for children. So what changed and gave her the confidence to allow her work to be seen? CreativityFound.co.uk Instagram: @creativityfoundpodcast Facebook: @cre...