Start To Teach Creative Workshops 2025

ONLINE workshop: ‘START TO TEACH CREATIVE WORKSHOPS’ – get now immediate access to this 4-hour workshop

*** THIS WORKSHOP TOOK PLACE ON Fri 2 May – Join below for IMMEDIATE ACCESS to the 4-hour in-depth and super practical workshop’s recording + presentation + resources below.

Are you a creative who wants to start to teach your creative workshops or courses in-person? Or maybe you have dabbled a little with teaching already, but want to get more serious, and charge properly for your creative skills & expertise. Do you want practical and expert advice on what & how to teach, how to plan, prepare & price your creative training, and what marketing to focus on to get your first signups? This short, practical online workshop is for wannabe creative teachers like you!

Teaching creative and craft skills has become very popular in the last few years, and it’s great to share your creative skills & knowledge, and get extra income! It’s the perfect (seasonal) opportunity to complement your creative product business.

But, there is a lot to juggle! What’s holding you back from starting to teach creative workshops? Can’t decide what to teach, how to become a more confident teacher, or how to price & promote your creative workshops? Teaching creative workshops is now much more competitive … so how will you stand out? You want your creative workshops to be affordable, but make you money too, right?!

In this practical 4-hour online workshop Patricia van den Akker, the Director of The Design Trust and author of the new book Teaching Creative Workshops In Person & Online, will show you step-by-step how to start teaching your creative workshops or courses professionally – from your home, studio space or at external venues.

In 9 steps she will cover everything that you need to know to start teaching creative & more unique workshops this summer or autumn. From what topic to choose and how, what and who to teach, to planning the right activities, to costing & pricing your creative training, and practical marketing advice to get bums on seats! If you need a bit of a nudge to kickstart your creative teaching … then this is the workshop is for you!

Can’t make it live? No problem! This online workshop will be recorded, and you will have access to the recording, presentation and additional resources in your private workshop hub for 6 months until Sunday 2 November 2025. You can post your questions and homework for written feedback from Patricia in this hub throughout this time.

*** UPGRADE to get a signed copy of Patricia’s book at the special discounted price of £25,- (incl. p&p in UK – only available for UK orders). We highly recommend that you have her book to make the most of this workshop. Details below.

You can book your place on the Start to Teach Creative Workshops session below, or upgrade to get Patricia’s book signed, for only £25,- (RRP £30,-). The book will be sent to you asap.

the key facts

• 4-hour online workshop on Friday 2 May 10am – 1pm (UK time)
• Outcome: Get ready to launch your in-person workshops this summer or autumn. From planning the content, to costing & pricing and marketing.
• Especially created for: Creative professionals who want to start teaching in person workshops or courses more professionally and creatively.
• Tutor: Patricia van den Akker – Director of The Design Trust, who wrote the book ‘Teaching Creative Workshops In Person & Online’.
• Time commitment: 3 hours for this training. We recommend additional time to develop, test, price and market your creative workshops.

want to start teaching your creative skills or projects, but not sure where to start?

Teaching your creative skills in workshops or courses has become a very popular income stream for creatives to make extra money, but it’s also wonderful to share your knowledge, experience & passion with others! Many more people are looking for new hobbies or skills, especially since Covid, and teaching is a great way to earn money (especially during the quieter months of the year). Many creatives have found that selling products has become harder, and teaching can be a great way to complement your product-business!

Patricia has developed this brand new, short online workshop for creative professionals who want to start teaching or are fairly new teachers who want to become more professional & confident with all aspects of their teaching business. In this workshop you will …

• Get clarity on WHY you want to teach, WHAT & HOW & WHERE you will teach and WHO. When you create and deliver training based on your unique talents, motivations and values you will be more confident, but also stand out in a competitive market! Patricia will help you to make key decisions on the topics to teach e.g. a specific technique, skills or project, or if it is broader around creativity or even transformational.
• Work & develop your own 3 training ideas that you want to teach, make decisions on what + how + where you will teach, and what to charge. You will start to create a lesson plan, and an action plan to launch your training (We suggest you aim for later this summer or autumn!). Find out what are the best times to launch and teach for you and your ideal students or participants. We will get you ready to launch soon after this workshop!
• Get Patricia’s expert top tips on costing & pricing your creative workshops, how to become a more confident teacher, and what the best ways are to promote your workshops to get more bookings.

We highly recommend that you have Patricia’s book on Teaching Creative Workshops in Person & Online already, or that you upgrade when you book your place to get a signed copy in the post before this workshop starts.

what will I do & learn during this 4 hour online ‘start to teach your creative workshops’ training?

This is a brand new and unique 3-hour online workshop that Patricia has created to complement the launch of her book, and to inspire professional creatives who want to start teaching creative workshops to get better organised, to become more creative & confident teachers, and to promote and price in-person training professionally!

PLEASE NOTE … this is a really practical online workshop where you will be working on your teaching ideas, by yourself and with other participants in the break out rooms and in the chat. We suggest that you work towards launching your creative training this summer or autumn! Be ready to get involved and to share with others when you join us live.

During this 3-hour online workshop Patricia will take you step-by-step through the 9 key questions and decisions to start teaching your creative skills:

1. WHY do you want to teach? And especially in-person training. What are your unique motivations to teach, and why is it important to know that?
2. WHAT do you want to teach? How to decide on the right topic. Will it be a skill or project, about creativity or transformation? And why it might NOT be a good idea to teach your own specialist skills! (You will need to get a bit more creative) What are your learning goals? What will your participants learn or do? And … how to decide WHO your ideal student or participant is! You will identify and work on your own 3 training ideas during this practical online workshop.
3. HOW to teach. What are the best formats & activities when teaching your creative workshops in person? Patricia will share really practical ideas to achieve your training goals better, and to bring some variety and diversity to your training skills and activities. She will also share her expert tips on becoming a more confident teacher and how to avoid issues.
4. Start to plan your training: When is the best time to teach? When do you need to launch? We recommend you start small with a half-day workshop, and even do some test workshops in advance! During this 3-hour workshop you will start to create a lesson plan for one of your training ideas.
5. WHERE to teach? What are the pro and cons of teaching at home or in your studio vs elsewhere? Patricia will tell you how to find venues or partners, what to look for in a great venue, and make your space a great inspiring and welcoming place to teach and learn. You will also get access to some very handy downloadable checklists too in the workshop hub afterwards, which will save you time.
6. What to charge – to make it affordable for your participants, but profitable for you. Patricia will explain how to identify all the costs for your training idea, and what to charge to cover your costs. She will introduce the most common pricing strategies for creative training, so you can decide which one is best for you & your business. Afterwards Patricia will share a super handy tool and template to create your own financial forecast, and make your teaching work financially.
7. How to get paid and keep it legal. What are the easiest ways to sell tickets? How to minimise the admin. And what do you need to do legally, incl. required insurance.
8. How to promote your creative workshops to get your first signups. Patricia will share her expert marketing tips to make the most of your website, keywords, local marketing and events to get bookings. She will tell you her own marketing secrets too (based on 20+years of teaching workshops)! Patricia will share an example of a launch plan with the exact marketing activities that will help you to get more ticket sales.
9. What’s next? At the end of this online workshop you will create an action plan to launch your first workshops (maybe even later this year)! With tips from Patricia on what to focus on so that you are less stressed and overwhelmed.

By the end of this short online workshop you will have …

• Clarity on WHY, WHAT, WHO & WHERE you want to teach. With an outline of 3 specific training ideas for in person workshops.
• Started to create a lesson plan for one of your training ideas, with specific ideas on your learning goal, activities and timings.
• Created a financial forecast with the costs for your training and the potential income (incl. how many students you will teach, the ticket price, and how you can charge different prices)
• Started to work on a marketing launch plan and action plan to deliver and promote your training successfully later this year.

what will i get when i sign up for this short workshop?

When you sign up to this 3-hour online workshop you will get …

• An invitation to join this workshop live on Friday 2 May from 10am – 1pm UK. We recommend you try to join us live, so that you can work on your training ideas, ask Patricia questions and work with other creatives who want to start teaching in person.
• Get access and a license for one person to the recording and presentation of this workshop in our private workshop hub for 6 months, until Sunday 2 November 2025. In the private hub you can ask questions at any time, and also post homework to get personal written feedback from Patricia. You can watch the session again, or if you are unable to join us live you can watch it when it suits you.
• In the course hub you will get downloadable templates for: A) A lesson plan; B) A financial forecast; C) A launch marketing plan; D) A checklist to create the best teaching space; E) Handy checklists to get ready to deliver your training. This will save you a lot of time!
• EARLY BIRD OFFER: Book your place by Tuesday 22 April to get Patricia’s specially designed brainstorming map (see image below) to plan out and work on your creative training for free (RRP £15,-) This A2 map will be posted to you by mail. Sorry only one per person (even if you book other sessions), and for UK orders only. This printed map is only available if you join one or our teaching workshops in 2025. On one side you can brainstorm your teaching ideas, and on the other side you can plan your training throughout the year, workout your finances and your marketing. It’s super useful!

who is this ‘START TO TEACH CREATIVE WORKSHOPS’ TRAINING for?

Patricia created this short, practical workshop especially for:

• Creative professionals who want to start teaching in-person workshops or courses to adults, either in your own workspace or studio, or external venues. Or maybe you have started to teach already but need additional knowledge and skills around what to teach, how to become a more confident & creative teacher, charge professionally and promote your workshops better. We recommend that you have been working in your creative field at a professional level, for at least 3-4 years, before you start teaching others. If you have limited creative professional experience then you might want to consider teaching broader topics around creativity or a craft party, rather than specific skills and techniques.
• This workshop is especially aimed at creatives who want to teach in the informal sector (not at primary or secondary schools or FE or HE) so you have complete creative freedom what and how you teach, and you work as a freelancer/soletrader. Our clients work mostly in the creative visual sectors, such as crafts (jewellery, ceramics, textiles), design, photography, print making, stationery & homewares, interior and product design, graphic design, illustration etc. If you are planning to teach performing arts, dance, yoga, wellness & well-being workshops then we think this workshop is still very useful to you, but the examples are mostly showing visual art teaching. If you are unsure if this workshop is relevant to you then please get in touch by email on info@thedesigntrust.co.uk.
• This workshop is aimed at creatives who want to teach adults. If you are planning to teach children then the general aspects of this workshop are still very appropriate for you, but be aware that some things are different when teaching children, especially in terms of the business model and what you can charge for a session, and legally there are additional requirements. To avoid disappointment we will not include this information in this workshop, as it is aimed at teaching adults.
• Teaching can be fantastic and a great energy-driver, but you do need to be interested in other people, a good communicator and be pro-active! Ideally you have got some ideas already of what you want to teach, and bring these to the session. You are nearly ready to go, and you would love to start teaching either this summer or autumn, but need a bit of an extra push & inspiration to kickstart your creative teaching career. A willingness to try different approaches on how you teach, price and promote your workshops will come in handy too!

how to make the most of this 4-hour online workshop?

We highly recommend that you join this online workshop live on Friday 2 May 10am – 1pm UK, so that you can ask Patricia questions, and work by yourself and discuss your ideas and plans with fellow wannabe teachers in the breakout rooms or on the chat. We know that people who join us live get a lot more inspiration, support & ideas, and are much more likely to succeed.

We recommend that you purchase Patricia’s book Teaching Creative Workshops in Person & Online in advance of this workshop. You can upgrade when you book this workshop, and get a signed copy of the book with a discount.

Can’t make the live workshop? No problem! The workshop will be recorded and you will have access to the recording + presentation for 6 months until Sunday 2 November 2025.

To make the most of this workshop we recommend that you are ready to launch your test training or actual in-person workshops this summer or autumn. You will need to make time to plan, prepare, price, promote and get organised to do that. How long this will take depends on how experienced and ready you are already.

PATRICIA’S BOOK ‘TEACHING CREATIVE WORKSHOPS IN PERSON & ONLINE’

In 2022, Patricia was commissioned by Bloomsbury Publishing / Herbert Press to write ‘the handbook for creatives who teach’. After 3 years of research, interviewing many creative teachers in a wide range of disciplines, loads of writing and rewriting, loads of editing and designing … after 3 years of really hard work her first book Teaching Creative Workshops In Person & Online was published in February 2025.

This is a very practical and visual book for creative who want to teach workshops, courses, memberships or 121 and who want to create and deliver more creative and unique training, get organised and stand out with their training, and price and promote their creative training better. It’s full of practical expert advice, with regular reflective and action-taking activities and expert tips to move your teaching forward. With 16 case studies of creatives who teach, incl. ceramicists Linda Bloomfield, Kara Leigh Ford and Catherine Lucktaylor; textile artists Hanny Newton and Ekta Kaul, and a foreword by Keith Brymer Jones.

You can buy Patricia’s book Teaching Creative Workshops in Person & Online from Amazon, Waterstones and other online retailers, as well as from your local independent book shop.

Or you can purchase a signed copy of the book for only £25,- (incl. p&p) directly from Patricia if you upgrade when you join this online workshop. Sorry UK only.

We highly recommend that you purchase Patricia’s book in advance to accompany this short online workshop on teaching creative workshops.

FAQ: Got any further questions?

click the arrow to get your answers

• I want to teach children. Is this workshop right for me?

  This workshop is aimed at creatives who want to teach adults creative skills.

  Teaching children comes with its own, additional challenges, incl. content, pricing, managing groups, legal aspects. We will not discuss that in this workshop.

  However, we think that this workshop provides loads of knowledge and inspiration to create and launch workshops in general, and you can find the additional info you need online or by speaking with other creative teachers who teach children.

• I teach drama, dance, performing arts, yoga … to adults. Is this workshop for me?

  We would love you to join us!

  Although our expertise is working with creative visual artists and designers, in crafts, visual art, photography, illustration and the like, we think there is a lot of similarity and we think you will get a lot from this workshop too.

  You might need to be a little more creative with some of the examples that we share, but we think this is relevant to you too.

  If you have any questions then email us on info@thedesigntrust.co.uk with what you want to teach and we can give you a more specific answer.

• I can’t make it on Friday 2 May. Is that a problem?

  We recommend that you join the workshop live if at all possible, so that you can work in real time on your training ideas, work with fellow creative teachers, and ask questions live during the session.

  However, if you have other commitments or you live in a different time zone, then remember that this session will be recorded and posted on our private workshop hub.

  You will have access to the recording + presentation + hub for 6 months till 2 November 2025.

  PLEASE NOTE: It’s unlikely that we will run this online workshop again in 2025, so if you are not entirely ready yet then book it now and you can watch it later in the year when you are more ready.

• How much time will this workshop take?

  This online workshop is nice and short … just 3 hours! And we will pack a lot in that time!

  But to launch your creative workshops successfully later this year you will need to spend more time on preparing, planning, costing & pricing and marketing after this workshop. How much time that will take depends on your experience in these areas and how developed your training ideas are.

  But, this short workshop will give you the kickstart you need … and will save you a lot of time, money & energy!

• What if I am not very tech-savvy?

  We use Zoom for our online workshops – an online platform that’s very easy to access.

  A week before your workshop will start we will send you the details of how to sign up on Zoom for this session, and at the start of the session we will tell you briefly how to use Zoom, the breakout rooms and the chat. All of this is voluntary of course, but highly useful.

  Our private online platform (where we will post the presentation + recording afterwards) is really easy to use too. You’ll only need basic computer literacy in order to navigate it.

• I want to join with a friend. Can I share?

  When you buy an online workshop from us you purchase a single licence, which means that YOU CAN NOT share the recording or presentation with others who have not paid.

  Like you we are a small creative business, and this workshop is full of our copyrighted material and expertise that I have developed over the last 25 years. If you share with others who haven’t paid then you basically are stealing. We know you wouldn’t like it if others would do the same to you. So THANK YOU for not sharing with others.

  If we find out that you share illegally then unfortunately we will have to remove you from the workshop hub immediately and might ban you from any future workshops and courses too.

  If you work in a partnership or in a small team then you can share this with them.

• Till when can I book this workshop? And how long do I have access to this workshop?

  We highly recommend that you try to sign up for this workshop to join us live – in this case Friday 2 May from 10am – 1pm UK time.

  However you can still sign up for this workshop till Friday 18 July when we will close our shop. After that date this workshop recording & presentation will no longer be available to purchase for new students.

  All students will have access to the private hub with the workshop presentation + recording for 6 months till 2 November 2025.

• What if I need to cancel?

  The workshop will take place on Friday 2 May from 10am – 1pm UK and we will record the session and give you access to the recording and the presentation for 6 months till 2 November 2025. So if you are not able to make it live, you still have access to the recording!

  After this workshop has taken place we will not offer any refunds as you can still access it whenever you like.

  We recommend that you check that your broadband and wifi is sufficient to join the session live. We have not had any problems ever with anybody watching the recordings.

  If you need to cancel then please email us before the workshop has started on info@thedesigntrust.co.uk and you can get a full refund. Unfortunately it takes 5 – 10 working days for the money to be returned to your bank account.

   

• I have another question …

  If you have any other questions then please get in touch with us on info@thedesigntrust.co.uk and we are happy to help you there!