With Create Together, Fletcher Farm turns the page toward a new community artistic vision

By Lorien Strange
©2025 Telegraph Publishing LLC

Locals think they know what’s going on here,” says Kathryn Svec as she leans against a cabinet in a recently refurbished pottery studio. Outside the long, low building just north of Cavendish, everything is puddles and gray. But that’s not dampening the quiet enthusiasm of Create Together’s new executive director.

For 75 years, the former Fletcher Farm School for the Arts and Crafts, on Route 103, drew students and teaching artists from across the nation for classes in traditional arts. Outside of scholarships for Ludlow and Cavendish kids, their programs were largely inaccessible to locals.

Svec, who trained as a scientist, receiving her PhD in Cellular, Molecular and Biomedical Sciences from the University of Vermont in 2022, says the lack of reliable internet access and childcare prevented her from finding remote work in her field. But she was lured to Create Together by the arts nonprofit and serving local communities.

Create Together’s mission is to challenge the community’s ideas about who gets to be creative — and to offer a year-round artistic space that’s “affordable and accessible to working people specifically.”

Fletcher Farm’s main source of funding had been tuition, which got hit hard as the number of students dropped off during the Covid pandemic and online arts and crafts instruction increased.

“If you follow the same model for 75 years, at some point it’s going to need an update,” says Svec. The organization closed temporarily last year as its Board of Directors searched for a way to move forward. They then renamed it  Create Together, still under the Fletcher Farm Foundation.

Now, besides a more rigorous financial management system, Create Together has a more “diversified streams of revenue,” says Svec.  Instead of relying mostly on classes and workshops, their new financial model includes funds from grants, memberships, donations, studio fees and a corporate sponsor.

One grant came from the Vermont Community Foundation, and Create Together is putting it to work with its Creating in Community series of free monthly art sessions. The first of those, held in late October, attracted 21 participants who created a mixed-media representation of Okemo Mountain. Eventually, that work will be publicly displayed.

It’s just one of the several events and classes that the organization is scheduling for weekends or weeknights, which Svec hopes will allow more people to attend.

“Accessibility isn’t just about affordability,” she says. “The intensive, week-long classes (from the old model) were fantastic, and we’d definitely love to continue to do some of those in the future. But not everyone can take a week off of work to take an art class.”

And even for the free events like the Creating in Community series, “we want it to be a little more sophisticated than, ‘here, grab some pipe cleaners and pompoms,’ ” Svec laughs.

She wants future sessions to serve as an introduction to one of the creative disciplines at Create Together, getting people excited about the new spaces — especially the open studios.

After an introductory session going over use policies and the equipment, anyone who’s taken a multi-day beginner’s course in an art or craft can reserve time to work independently in the studios, by contacting Svec.

That way, Svec says, “You don’t have to own your own studio or equipment to learn an artistic discipline.”

Currently, there are studios for sewing and quilting, weaving, pottery, stained glass, precious metal fabricated jewelry and painting, as well as seasonal creative metalworking. A four-hour session in any studio is $20, not including materials. Click here for more information.

Artists find a home at Create Together studios

Enjoying the pottery studio on that rainy fall day was Nora Boyle, an artist and bookbinder and owner of  Lady Book Witch Press. Boyle was originally from New Hampshire and moved to Vermont from Durham, N.C., in August.

“It’s a gorgeous studio, and they did a great job setting it up,” she says, thinking of local potters Jane Wojick, Laura Bliss and Marcia Dockum, who worked to transform the space. The studio is equipped with five potter’s wheels, a slab roller, dust-resistant tabletops and a staff-operated kiln.

After having access to the artistic resources of a city, Boyle was “itching to find a pottery studio” when she moved to the much more rural West Windsor.  “I love pottery, and it’s definitely a great mental health resource for me,” she says.  While Boyle initially found Create Together as an outlet for her passion for clay, she quickly got involved in the organization as a studio monitor and teacher.

She’s now teaching an introductory class in pottery wheel throwing and is talking with Svec about holding some bookbinding classes.

“I taught a lot of bookbinding classes in Durham, mostly with the Durham Arts Council. There’s so much personal meaning in creating the physical object that will tell your story,” says Boyle. Currently working as a middle school art teacher for The Sharon Academy and as a freelance writer, she’s excited about seeking out local art studios and getting involved as she can.

“It seems like a nice, fun time to jump in to Create Together, as they’re going through so many changes,” Boyle says. “They’re open to ideas and feedback, and I have the opportunity to help shape the community, which doesn’t happen often.”

Glass, metal, fiber, cloth and clay

From the pottery building, Svec led the way through the drizzle, uphill to the fiber arts studios.

One of the biggest changes from the former Fletcher Farm is that Create Together operates year-round. But it has not yet possible to heat all the spaces, including the iconic white barns that along Route 103.

So the studios are limited to the two buildings they can heat: the pottery studio and the two-story Meadowview building. The second floor, which now hosts the sewing and weaving spaces, can only be accessed from outside.

“Eventually, some stairs inside would be convenient for days like this,” says Svec.

Despite the dreary day, the space is bright and clean, with well-organized bobbins of yarn, weaving tools and sewing machines shining with possibilities.

In one corner, a sleek quilting machine occupying a table’s worth of space sat below a cool-toned quilt of a fish jumping through a river.

To anyone familiar with her art, it’s immediately recognizable as the work of Susan Damone Balch, expert quilter, teaching artist and the previous executive director of what became Create Together.

In addition to continuing to teach, she also advised on the set-up of the quilting studio. “In constructing our new studio spaces, we were actually able to consult local artists,” says Svec. “And they were very direct about telling us what we needed.”

Svec says that since many of the artists formerly involved with Fletcher Farm are locals, she reached out to them. “We wouldn’t be here without” them, Svec says, and the organization remains dependent upon them.

She said they’re still looking for more studio monitors, administrative help, event coordinators and anyone with ideas for workshops and classes as either teachers or students.

“We’re throwing spaghetti at the wall with our programming, trying to see what sticks,” Svec says adding that she encourages locals to tell her what classes they’d like to see at Create Together. “It’s a lot easier than trying to guess,” she adds.

True to her roots as a scientist, Svec has introduced a few programs blending science and art. This past summer, Create Together held a STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math) day camp for kids. And last weekend, Create Together hosted a free natural dyes and cyanotyping workshop from a Rural Rivers quilt mapping project developed by Dartmouth College and the Colorado School of Mines.

As for the future, Svec says she hopes that Create Together can serve as an accessible hub for creative activity and expand its programming. “It’s been great to see people come in and go, ‘oh, I can see myself here!’ ”

For more information call 802-228-8770 or email: info@CreateTogetherVT.org.