Valentines Day Gift Guide

Valentines Day is only five days away… if you’re lost for ideas this year, pop into Our Handmade Collective where we are more than happy to offer our expertise to help you pick out the perfect one of a kind present for your favourite person.

Beautiful cards, homemade fudge, geeky framed art, scented candles, unusual jewellery, handmade smellies and endless cute and fun heart themed gifts from over 50 sellers all housed under one roof. We love these paper folded tulips that will last as long as your relationship and this vinyl record card for those who share a passion for music.

We offer a gift wrapping service too, so you could drop by on your lunch break and leave fully prepared for the most romantic day of the year. Don’t forget we’re now open Mondays too!

If you’re stuck for something to do on Valentines Day why not come along to the Grand Arcade: we have a gorgeous vintage tea shop, authentic Colombian coffee, a wide range of dishes on offer in our vegetarian restaurant and you could even pick out your own gifts from our emporium of handmade goodies 🙂

See you at the shop x

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Small Business Saturday

The first shopping Saturday in December has come to be known as SMALL BUSINESS SATURDAY, supporting and promoting all those lovely independent businesses that make up the corners of your city and online.

Come on down to Our Handmade Collective today and not only will you be celebrating our little shop with us, but you will also be supporting all our independent designers too – there’s 58 designers all under one roof!
If you shop with us today you’ll get an awesome goody bag and two stamps for the price of one on your loyalty cards!!

There are incredible benefits to shopping small: Each product is handcrafted with incredible attention to detail and you’d be hard pressed to find the same product elsewhere on the high street.

Get something a little bit different for your loved ones this year and if you’re completely stuck for ideas there are no better experts than the staff at Our Handmade Collective to help pick out the perfect gift. We’re friendly and easy to approach and we genuinely love each and every product in store, handpicked by our owners Claire & Natalie.

We have home decor ideas from gorgeous lamps to fun signs to brighten up your bathroom and kitchen, hand sewn gifts, scarves and mittens for your Grandma who is always hard to buy for, a fun and kooky moustache for your daughter, gifts made from a vinyl record for your musician boyfriend, a cute dog brooch for the dog walker and gorgeous handmade jewellery for your mum, sister and girlfriend. We also provide a gift wrapping service too, so you can leave with all your presents bought and wrapped with weeks to go!

While you’re here you can grab a coffee at Casa Colombiana or groom that post Movember facial hair at The Traditional Shaving Company and support all the amazing small businesses that we live alongside in the Grand Arcade!

Don’t worry if you can’t make it today, you can support us everyday as we’re now open until Christmas Eve.

See you at the shop x

We need more Mistletoe, Mince Pies & Mulled Wine…

We’re recovering a little after our Christmas Launch event – all your Our Handmade Collective Christmas elves are worn out, but our little happy hearts are filled with love for everyone that came out to join us, brought friends & family and shared the event far and wide. It was fantastic to see so many of our lovely customers drinking mulled wine and eating our award winning fudge! THANK YOU.

We had an absolute blast! How about you? In fact, we had so much fun that we’re secretly planning a follow up event! What do you think, would you like More Mistletoe, Mince Pies & Mulled Wine?

Let us know if you’d like to come back again and we’d love you to share your purchases with us on social media… unless they’re gifts of course! Those need to stay super secret.

Don’t forget that we are also now open every day until Christmas so you can shop with us at your convenience….including late night Thursdays until 8.00pm.

If you enjoyed your shopping experience, please feel free to pop us a review on Trip Advisor – we’re number one for Shopping in Leeds you know! Cheers!

See you at the shop x

 

Mistletoe, Mince Pies & Mulled Wine!

There are only 62 days until Christmas!! Don’t panic, if you haven’t started Christmas shopping yet, we’re waiting for you at Our Handmade Collective.

Even better, we’re going to make the task FUN. Bucket loads of our sellers will be in attendance on 30th October wearing daft Christmas jumpers and handing out Mince Pies & Mulled Wine. You can even kiss your sweetie under the Mistletoe.

If that’s not enough to tempt you, how about 10% off hundreds of products in store for one night only? Handmade, unique and a bargain. Why, you might just get all your presents in one go!

On the night we’ll be announcing the winners of the Box of Delights raffle! Get your ticket in store now for just £1. Proceeds go towards saving the beautiful clock in our Grand Arcade and restore it to it’s former glory.

As well as being an unmissable night, our festive party marks the start of our Christmas opening hours. We’ll be open SEVEN DAYS A WEEK and for those who can’t stomach weekend shopping, you can pop in after work on a Thursday until 8pm!

If you’re at a complete loss for what to buy your loved ones this Christmas, you’re in luck! Our staff are experts at gift giving and will be more than happy to help you pick out the greatest gift you’ve given yet. We even offer gift wrap from £1.50. If you really can’t decide, give the gift of choice with our gift vouchers available in store! You could only get a better service from Santa himself! 😉

Don’t forget your Christmas jumper at the event, there’s a prize for the best one! See you at the shop x

Mother’s Day Gifts

We have a lot of new gifts in the shop from our makers ready for Mother’s Day. But what should you get her to make her feel special? How about….

Flowers…

Instead of getting your mum a bunch of flowers that will only last a few days, why not get her a cute crocheted pot plant decoration (with matching card) that she can keep forever! Designed and made locally by Rose Cottage Crafts.

Or quirky kitsch rings upcycled by Urban Magpie from old china flowers decorations.

Jewellery…..

Why not treat her to some unique handmade jewellery. We have stunning silver crafted by Seabreeze Designs,

and lovely sea glass carefully made into unique items by Shedplay.

Food….

If your mum is a real foodie then why not get her some delicious Harrogate Preserves, Handmade chocolates from Chocolate Chest or sweets from Hello Sweet Thing

or a wooden board from Gourmet Food Boards.

or a stylish apron handmade by Kitsch-ina that is too beautiful just to wear in the kitchen!

Fashion and Accessories….

Does your mum always want to look her best? How about a handmade bag that is unique by Made by Marianne.

or something from vintage fabrics by Natalie Breeze designs

We have lots of beautiful handmade bags including this bright range by Punto Belle

Also stunning range of gadget cosies from Urban Fox

Bath and Beauty…

Colourful bath salts from Blue Butterfly

or handmade natural bath bombs from Little Shop of Lathers

Homeware…..

A wide range of cushion, notice boards, tea towels and mugs from The Little Button Co.

Stunning hand-painted glasses make a great gift from Handmade by Natalie

Hanging hearts with beautiful quotations and sentiment on them by The Wilsons

Or hanging pottery butterflies by Detty Marie Ceramics

Many scented candles including these in vintage china from Aunt Sallys Upcycled Crockery

Also upcycled old china plates or vinyl records made into cakestands or sandwich platter (vinyl by Melodies)

For the mum that has everything….

Hand felted covered books and journals by George and Lilly

or buy her a craft kit and she can make her own gift and have fun doing it

Cards and Wrapping…

A wide range of cards for all occasions including for Mother’s Day

and a lot of them can be frames to make great gifts

Take advantage of our Gift Wrapping service or buy some special clay tags from RedRat Designs

 

Valentines Gifts

This gallery contains 29 photos.

Valentine Gifts Ideas Cards Gift ideas for her   Gift ideas for him

Love is in the Air…

We have some amazing handmade Valentine’s Day treats in-store now for you – from traditional to contemporary, funny to sentimental and quirky to tongue-in-cheek gifts, all handmade and unique!

There are  gifts for the girls, gifts for the guys, traditional gifts of jewellery, sweets, chocolate, little tokens to amuse and delight – and some quirky and special treats you won’t find anywhere else!
Here are just some of the goodies we have available:

And…. as if all this isn’t enough we are also running a series of ‘Personalise your own cards while you wait’ workshops!

On 2nd, 8th and 9th February you can call in to us and meet PetelovesOrla and Boondoggle Studio, who will have a range of cards available which you can have personalised for the fabulous price of £4.00 – a truly unique greetings card! Some choices of card include:

Hope to see you there! Don’t forget with the changes to Handpicked Hall you can now only get inside from Grand Arcade. The main entrance to Handpicked Hall on Vicar Lane is now closed but you can still get into Grand Arcade from Vicar Lane or New Briggate and then come upstairs where the fun is happening!

On the Twelfth Day of Christmas , my true love gave to me…. some lovely OHC goodies!

One of our talented makers Juliette of UrbanFox has been photographing everybody’s creations and making them into the Twelve Days of Christmas. She has created this amazing animation to include all the seasonal goodies we have on offer.

On our Facebook page we’d all been trying to work out the Our Handmade Collective’s version of the festive song and we came up with:

On the first day of Christmas OHC gave to me… a smiley sprout in a tree!

On the second day of Christmas OHC gave to me… two Christmas stockings

On the third day of Christmas OHC gave to me… three Christmas puddings

On the fourth day of Christmas OHC gave to me… four hats and scarves

On the fifth day of Christmas OHC gave to me… five comfy cushions

On the sixth day of Christmas OHC gave to me… six mugs for drinking

On the seventh day of Christmas OHC gave to me… seven frames-a-hanging

On the eighth day of Christmas OHC gave to me… eight reindeers flying

On the ninth day of Christmas OHC gave to me… nine stars-a-twinkling

On the tenth day of Christmas OHC gave to me… ten pinnies-a-prancing

On the eleventh day of Christmas OHC gave to me… eleven bags-a-toting

On the twelfth day of Christmas OHC gave to me… twelve cards-a-greeting

Each day on our Facebook page we feature an album of photographs of wonderful handmade gifts that fit the day’s song.

Meet SciArtImages

Our final maker for today is Dr Neil Taylor of SciArtImages.  He reveals the beauty of the microscopic world from his laboratory / studio in York.

During a long career as a research scientist Neil was used to seeing the wonders of the microscopic world. Utilising this experience Neil now reveals this incredible beauty to those not normally lucky enough to be able to see it, using his microscope photographs to create a range of cards and unusual and interesting gifts.

Neil’s photographs are amazing and you can buy a mug, pocket mirror, key fob, cufflinks and matching card, all with many interesting colours and effects.

I’ll be buying some of these lovely cufflinks for Father’s Day on 16th June. We open on Friday 14th June, so plenty of time to buy – but hurry! I can see Neil selling out of these VERY quickly! Perhaps you should come to our exclusive preview evenings on Wednesday 12th and Thursday 13th June 2013 at 4-7pm to make sure you gets your first!!