5 "Crafty" Vacation Ideas in the Smoky Mountains

The word “vacation” conjures up as many different scenarios as there are vacationers. Some people just want to get away from the stress of work, traffic and schedules, and relax by the beach or in a secluded mountain cabin. Others want excitement and find it in theme parks, outdoor adventures and the attractions and events of a big city. Still others want to go exploring whether it’s just down the road or in some exotic locale on the other side of the world. Whatever form they take, in the end, vacations allow us to immerse ourselves, even for a brief time, in locations, events and activities markedly different from those in our daily lives. While there is no single way to vacation, many people have begun looking for vacation experiences beyond the typical “see-do-shop” variety. Volunteer vacations, both in the United States and abroad, are becoming popular. During one- and two-week stays, volunteers help non-profit organizations and government agencies with a variety of projects, including community development, teaching and park trails maintenance.

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about my wanting to have a different vacation experience and my choice to attend a woodturning workshop at the Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts. While I ultimately chose to attend Arrowmont, my research turned up four other programs in the Smoky Mountains region that provide similar arts and crafts experiences:

1. Appalachian Center for Craft – If you’re looking for total immersion – and seclusion - Tennessee Tech University’s Appalachian Center for Craft might be just what you’re looking for. The Craft Center is located about six miles south of Interstate 40 near Smithville, TN. Programs include undergraduate and non-degree certificate programs, but also public workshops held throughout the year, evening, three-day and six-day workshops, and a three-week intensive held in June. Instruction is provided in blacksmithing, clay, fiber arts, glass, metals and wood. Room and board is available during the three-week June and six-day July sessions. During the Fall and Spring semesters, workshop students can choose from several motels and campsites nearby. Day visitors are welcome at the Craft Center where they can shop in the Center’s art gallery, tour the latest exhibition, have lunch and hike. There are also two annual events sponsored by the Craft Center – the Annual Celebration of Craft in April and the Annual Holiday Festival held the weekend after Thanksgiving.

2. Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts - One of Gatlinburg, Tennessee's greatest treasures - and best-kept secrets - sits tucked away just off of the Parkway at stoplight #3. Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts offers one- and two-week workshops for all skill levels in a variety of media. Originally founded by the Phi Beta Pi Fraternity in 1912 as a settlement school, by the 1970s, Arrowmont had become a place for artists to gather, learn and socialize. One- and two-week workshops are offered each year from May to October in clay, fiber and textiles, glass, metals and enamels, painting, drawing, printmaking, photography, woodturning and woodworking. Arrowmont also offers several “special topics” workshops, including stone work, book making and animation. Accomodations are available in both historic and modern facilities. Family-style meals are served three times each day. Many students attend Arrowmont through the school’s work study program, trading one week of work for one week of class.

3. Dollywood Craft Preservation School – If you think Dollywood is about the razzle dazzle country queen with a good helping of hillbilly hokum, you’re right – mostly. But tucked up behind the growing number of thrill rides, eateries, shops and stage shows are a group of craftspeople demonstrating blacksmithing, wood carving, candle making and more. I have found several accounts online about the school, but cannot find specific information on the Dollywood web site. Unlike the other schools, visitors to Dollywood can only take a weekend workshop in several craft areas. In some way, I can understand the "secrecy" of not wanting to advertise the workshops too much. I'm not sure the park could accommodate the thousands of people who might think they want to take a workshop, but who might not find it as fun as, say, riding the roller coaster. If you're planning a trip to Dollywood and want to try your hand at some mountain crafts without the larger expense of a week-long workshop, you can call the main number at 1-800-365-5996 for more information.

4. John C. Campbell Folk School – Much like Arrowmont, the John C. Campbell Folk School was begun to educate local residents and to preserve the mountain craft heritage of the region. The school is located in Brasstown, NC, just east of Murphy, NC. Campbell offers over 860 one-week and weekend workshops each year, according to their web site. Like the other schools, Campbell offers many crafts, like blacksmithing, weaving, woodturning and quilting. They also offer a unique variety of other heritage arts and crafts, including cooking, storytelling, dance and nature studies. Room and board is available on campus, and there are many opportunities for socializing during the week. Day visitors are welcome and can tour the school’s museum, shop, walk the campus’ nature trails, and, with reservations, have lunch with students, faculty and staff.

5. Penland School of Crafts – With a history dating back to the 1920s, Penland School of Crafts is located northeast of Asheville, NC and offers another unique learning vacation experience. Each summer, the school offers 98 one- or two-week classes in books and paper, clay, drawing and painting, glass, iron, metals, photography, printmaking, textiles, wood, and other media. In the fall and spring, the school offers eight-week “intensives,” plus several other residency programs for more serious craft students. Here, too, accommodations and meals are available, although all of Penland’s dormitory-style housing is not air-conditioned. Day visitors are welcome.

I should mention that there is another “collection” of arts and crafts schools located in New England, plus one other I found in Arkansas. Do you know of other similar arts and crafts programs in the United States or in other countries? Would you take a vacation like this?

I should also say that I am, in no way, affiliated with any of these organizations, especially Dollywood, other than being a student at Arrowmont and a visitor at John C. Campbell. I have tried to provide the most accurate information about each organization (notice there are no published costs), but please check the web site of each organization or call them for the most up-to-date information.

Historic Home Tours: One Size Does Not Fit All

As an aspiring preservationist and historic home curator, one of the highlights of my trip to Virginia this summer was going on tours of three historic homes. When I lived in the DC area in the late 80s and early 90s, I made it to many of the essential tourist sites - the Jefferson and Lincoln Memorials, the Capitol, the Library of Congress, and almost all of the Smithsonian museums. I also spent many weekends at the National Gallery of Art. Sometimes, on these outings, I would have a companion, but just as often, I would go it alone. While in Virginia this summer, I had the pleasure of my Aunt Maggie's company on a couple of house tours. She was definitely one of the best "tourist buddies" I've had. We toured two homes together - Mount Vernon and Woodlawn Plantation. Then, I toured one other home - Frank Lloyd Wright's Pope-Leighey House - alone (Maggie had to take my cousin to a doctor's appointment). After our tours, what struck me most was not the architecture, furnishings or the stories the various docents told us, but how different the nature of three different tours were.

We started with Mount Vernon. Because of the numbers of people who tour the grounds and home, the tour of Mount Vernon was very well-organized, but somewhat regimented and impersonal. The posts and chains seen bordering the lawns in the picture above, in some sense, extend into the home itself. Visitors enter through a side door that leads into a beautiful dining room. The docent delivers her speech and one joins a line that snakes through the house giving you glimpses of porch, receiving hall, bedrooms and Washington's office. And I do mean "glimpses." Being a part of this circuitous line, one feels obliged to keep moving so as not to slow things up. (Although we did encounter one little princess of a girl whose mother had no qualms about letting her hold up the line with her toddler-sized histrionics.) Once you exit the house, there is freedom to walk the grounds, take pictures and tour the museum and education center. Now, don't get me wrong, the tour of Mount Vernon is nice. The docents know their scripts well and do their best to engage visitors with simple questions. And, of course, the house is amazing.

A few days later Maggie and I went to Woodlawn Plantation, the home of Martha Washington's daughter and George Washington, step-daughter. This tour was completely different to the one at Mount Vernon. First of all, Maggie and I were the only people on the tour. It reminded me of other historic homes where docents wait patiently - and, sometimes, desperately - for the odd visitor to arrive. After paying the admission fee and me making a quick trip outside, around the corner of the house, and down a set of stairs to the restrooms, we entered Woodlawn through the front door, which, once inside, the docent locked and barred with one of those beams you see doors locked with in the movies. For a minute, I thought we were trapped! The tour of Woodlawn was, in a word, leisurely. Because we had the docent to ourselves, we were able to ask questions and get more information than what one gets from a "canned" interpretive script. For me, one of the more interesting points the docent made was how the curators of the home had decided to reset how the rooms were cordoned off. Before, as is typical in many homes, including Mount Vernon, visitors were allowed to enter into rooms within about a three-feet by three-feet area just inside the door. Recently, the ropes had been moved to allow visitors to entire the room entirely while maintaining a proper distance from the furniture, especially the beds and chairs. (In one room, I nearly made a new exit through one of the walls, when a closet door began to open on its own. I was sure we were being visited by a ghost. The docent pointed out that the door led to offices for the staff. Whew!) In the end, the tour of Woodlawn was, as I said, leisurely and very well done.

On the same property as Woodlawn, but well enough removed so as not to compete with it, is the Pope-Leighey house, an example of Frank Lloyd Wright's "Usonian" house design. As I said, I toured this one alone, since my Maggie had to take my cousin to a doctor's appointment. (I say "alone." There were 6 or 7 in our particular group.) Again, this tour was unlike either Mount Vernon or Woodlawn. First, and most noticeably, we were allowed - or maybe, made - to sit down on chairs in the living area. To be honest, the chairs are reproductions from Wright's designs. Also, nothing was cordoned off as in the other homes. While we stayed with our tour group, the docent showed us through the house - which is much smaller than either of the previous homes - as if we were guests visiting for the first time. At each stop - bedrooms, bathroom, kitchen, dining area - she encouraged us enter completely and look around. Our docent was also the kind that, while she had a script and key points memorized, also gave us "behind-the-scenes" anecdotes about the "Usonian" houses, the previous owner and the preservation process. She also sprinkled her talk with some personal opinions. Some might find such personal interjections improper or off-putting, but I felt it spoke of a genuine and personal connection to the home, as if, in a way, it was hers.

So, three very different tours of three very different homes. What historic homes have you visited where the style of tour made an impression on you? Was the impression favorable? Or not?

An Outing Fit for a King

On my recent trip to Virginia to visit family, I took in many sites that I had never been to, even though I had lived in the area. Toward the end of the week, my aunt had to take my cousin to a doctor's appointment, so I decided to go for a drive. I visited Fredericksburg, VA and then, headed out the King's Highway just to see what was there. I stopped for a minute at George Washington's birthplace and then, in King George, came across this great little church - St. John's Episcopal Church. What struck me was the bell tower. I have never seen one like it. Being an Episcopal church in a town named King George, I would assume the architecture is in an English style. To me, though, it looks like it has Dutch or German influences. I'll have to do some research. What do you think?

The Grand Dame of H Street, NE

Recently, the National Trust for Historic Preservation has been running a campaign where people across the country photograph themselves with buildings and hold a sign that reads "This Place Matters." For me, the building in this photograph definitely matters. It sits on the corner of H and Third Streets, NE in Washington, DC. Originally built in the late 1800s to serve as a convent and nursing home run by the Little Sisters of the Poor, by the 1970s, Capital Children's Museum had taken up residency and transformed the building into a wonderland. I began working at the Museum in 1987 and instantly fell in love with the place. Everyone on staff work hard, none more than our executive director, Ann Lewin, to keep the exhibits and building repaired. Even then, the building was showing its age. There were many days when the elevator wouldn't work, the heat was not enough in the winter and the air conditioning kept no one cool in the summer. But we had fun, especially, I hope, the families who came to visit. There are too many special memories of the eight years I spent at the Museum to recount here - working until 3 a.m. on a new exhibit, welcoming dignitaries and celebrities, being on your best behavior while the Secret Service conducted mock tours (the building had so many nooks and crannies, it was perfect for them), and many days and nights spent with some of the most talented, creative and smart people I have ever worked with.

The Museum closed its doors in 2005 to begin the process of opening a new museum - the National Children's Museum - in a modern facility (now scheduled to be built at the National Harbor complex). When I heard the news of the Museum closing, I worried about the fate of the old building. Who would want it? Would it be torn down? Luckily, a developer saw the potential of the building, and in what turned out to be a great at example or reuse, turned the building into apartments. The developer also built two mid-rise apartments on the site - one square block.

I visited the building recently and seeing it was a little bittersweet. I am so glad it was saved from the wrecking ball, but it was little sad that will never again "my Museum."

Preservationists Rally Against Plan for “Pit” in Union Station

How timely to my previous post on personal memories of Union Station. I agree that the proposed modifications to the Grand Hall are misguided. At one time, the Grand Hall was the waiting area for the trains. It must have been something to sit on a bench and look up at those Stoic soldiers watching over everyone. When Union Station was re-opened in the late 1980s, the first time I entered the Grand Hall, it was, for me, one those "wow" moments that one enjoys in the grand architecture of DC, much like walking into the Capitol building the first time or the Library of Congress or the original National Gallery building. While the Center Cafe doesn't "fit" with the design of the Hall, any further modern modifications should be discouraged. It is just as easy to get to the lower level via staircases and escalators just behind the Grand Hall.
Preservationists Rally Against Plan for “Pit” in Union Station