Tramore Development Trust celebrates 20-year milestone
Tramore Development Trust celebrates 20-year milestone; This month the Tramore Development Trust celebrates its 20th anniversary and to mark that occasion they re-open a newly renovated Tramore Coastguard Cultural Centre which features a Café, Visitor Centre and Gallery and they are launching a brand new website www.coastguardcreatives.ie which is a collective of local art and craft community members whose work is now available for sale on the website.
Tramore Development Trust is a community-led voluntary group who have over the last 20 years been the backbone of many of the town’s developments including the conversion, opening and management of the Tramore Coastguard Cultural Centre, the creation and management of the Lafcadio Hearn Japanese Gardens, the conversion and refurbishment of the former Friends Meeting House into an After School Childcare Centre plus the preparation of the Tramore Community Plan which firmly places a focus on the future development of Tramore.
The Coastguard Creatives is an art, craft and design collective, made up of people working and living in the area. The group have been collaborating since October 2019 and continues to grow in size and vibrancy with the guidance of Marie Power, (The Sea Gardener) local artisan food producer and forager.
Chair of the Tramore Development Trust Anne Harpur says, “We are delighted to celebrate the milestone of 20 years for Tramore Development Trust. There has been a lot achieved by our voluntary group at this time and we have lots of large scale future ambitions for the town yet. We hope to continue to engage with the community and further drive the future of our beautiful town while celebrating its noble past and historic buildings, offering a new lease of life for all.”
Speaking of launching their first e-commerce shop and going online with Tramore’s Art and Craft community Anne says, “We have been working with the local arts and crafts community members to create a collective in Tramore over the last year, hosting events such as the Christmas Craft Fair and selling their works in our retail space at the Cultural Centre.
Our long-term ambition to bring this retail opportunity online was accelerated during the COVID lockdown phases and we are now delighted to launch an online shop filled with over 80 unique pieces of art and craft all of which have been created by some of the fantastic art and craft creators in Tramore and Waterford.”
CoastguardCreatives.ie features handmade leather handbags, original art and prints, crystal and silver jewellery, natural skincare products, timber kitchen chopping boards, beautiful handmade porcelain ceramics, stained and fused glass art, local food produce, gorgeous natural beeswax products, original fashion pieces and more all created by 19 art and craft creators.
The online shop sells and ships the items all across Ireland, the UK and the US and for people living locally, there is also the option to browse the shop in person at the Tramore Coastguard Cultural Centre.
Speaking of the Café and retail space re-opening at Tramore Coastguard Cultural Centre Anne says, “The café and retail shop will be open 7 days per week from June 29th We have put in place all of the HSA measures in order to re-open in the safest possible manner for our team and for our customers. A new queue system will be in place, there will be the correct physical distance between tables and additional outside tables and we are asking all of our customers to adhere to the social distancing guidelines outlined by the government too.
We are very excited to welcome visitors back to the Tramore Coastguard Cultural Centre and in the meantime, we are encouraging everyone to take a look at the beautiful online shop at www.coastguardcreatives.ie and consider having a gorgeous gift or treat delivered right to their door.”
The new Coastguard Creatives website has been supported by Waterford Local Enterprise Office.
