2024 Workshops and Intensives

January 26-28

Join us in the beautiful Catskill Mountains for our second annual Winter Leather Crafting Seminar! This year the Maker Camp has teamed up with renowned leather craftsmen Ethan Carter and Dennis Forrester from 21Grams Leather to bring you our most comprehensive leather crafting class to date! This class is suitable for Makers of all skill levels.

Over the course of the weekend students will:

• Complete a series of “intro” projects to learn the basics of leather craft
• Learn the basics of leather tooling
• Apply these skills to the creation of a pair of handmade sneakers

INCLUDED WITH CLASS:

• Room and board at the Blackthorne Resort 
• Entry into class
• All tools and materials needed for class

*Class size limited to 14 people

February 9-11

Join us for this full weekend hands-on epoxy resin workshop led by Dre Fandetti of @craftswithdre. Throughout the course of the weekend attendees will work together to create a 6’ diameter Maker Camp round table using a variety of epoxy resin techniques. 

INCLUDED IN WORKSHOP:

• Room and board at the Blackthorne Resort
• Entry into workshop
• All tools and materials included

February 23-25

Join us this coming February for our second annual Maker Camp Silversmithing Intensive! This year we will once again be led by the talented Kerges Nimen of Kerges Nimen Silversmithing in a weekend long silversmithing project that will teach students the fundamentals of silversmithing in general. This years project will be a cuff bracelet with a set stone and embellishments!

In this full-weekend course, students will:

• Process scrap silver into usable material
• Learn about the different types of solder and their uses
• Set a stone into their piece
• Add embellishments to their piece

INCLUDED WITH CLASS

• Room and board at the Blackthorne Resort
• Entry into class
• All tools and materials needed for class

*Class size is limited to 8 people

March 22-24

Join us for our third annual Blacksmithing Intensive led by Cliff Dufton and John Erianne of the Modern Forge. This class will cover:

• Forging a variety of blacksmithing chisels from easily sourced, high quality steel
• Hole punching, drifting, material isolation, tapering, finishing and more
• Going over types of steel and basic metallurgy
• Heat treating
• How to use your tools to make whatever you want!

After each day of class, there will be an Open Forge session where students can get free range of the Maker Camp blacksmithing setup and Cliff and Johns’ infinite wealth of blacksmithing knowledge 

INCLUDED IN CLASS:

• Room and board at the Blackthorne Resort
• Entry into class
• Open Forge Sessions
• All materials and tools provided

April 5-7

The Group Forge Project is a hands-on blacksmithing workshop guided by renown blacksmith and metal sculpter, Chris Cash of @mt_phillip_metal_work. Using a variety of blacksmithing and texturing techniques, attendees will work together to create a large-scale functional piece of metal art to live at the Blackthorne for the Maker Community to enjoy for Years to come. This years project will be a set of benches to accompany the giant fire pit we built last year! This class is limited to 25 people 

May 10-12

  The Maker Camp Hammer-In is basically a blacksmithing open house for smiths of all skill levels. Whether you are a seasoned professional or an amateur just looking to be introduced to the world of blacksmithing, this is a great event for you. While we have plenty of raw material and tools available for use, we highly encourage people to bring their own as well. If you plan on staying for the weekend, call the Blackthorne Resort office at (518)634-2541 to book your room

July 19-21

 Come help us out with another community-built timber frame project! Our Timber-In weekend is a perfect opportunity to learn all about traditional timber frame joinery. Led by master timber framer James Smith, attendees will learn how to cut mortise and tenons for a community-built timber frame structure that will be assembled at our Maker Camp in October!