Craftmaking workshops set at Northwind Art campus

Published 1:30 am Thursday, July 16, 2026

PORT TOWNSEND — Growing up in a small town, Dan Hawkins was not dazzled by local craftmaking traditions.

As a boy in New Gloucester, Maine — a woodsy community not so unlike Port Townsend — he’d see members of the Shaker community making their own brooms.

“This is kind of lame. I want to get out of here,” he remembered thinking at the village farm-day demonstrations.

Today, Hawkins has a completely different view.

After a decade of learning more about traditional art and craft, he’s a woodworker, broom maker and teacher who moved to Portland, Ore., in 2021. He will offer two classes at the nonprofit Northwind Art School in Port Townsend this summer: “Make Your Own Hand Broom” on Sunday and “Make Your Own Floor Broom” on Aug. 21.

For more information, go to https://northwind art.org under the Classes, Workshops and Camps heading.

Both classes will be at Northwind’s Fort Worden State Park campus.

Hawkins, who has worked as an architect and carpenter in Denmark, China and the United States, finds that, across many cultures, people craft brooms in much the same way and for similar reasons. These makers consider brooms not only effective for sweeping away debris but also good for clearing bad energy.

“In (my) workshops, I bring a library of reference books, of different broom-making cultures,” Hawkins said, adding he also invites people to share any personal memories they have with brooms.

In classes he teaches around the Pacific Northwest, Hawkins finds participants come in with a variety of inspirations: They may want to craft something to sweep away stagnant energy, or they just need a handsome broom to sweep the porch.

The experience of making brooms in a group is a satisfying one, he added. Hawkins loves the rustling sound of a dozen sweeping heads coming together. Then there’s the sorghum fibers’ earthy-sweet scent.

In the hand-broom class, participants will have time to make more than one of the small, turkey-wing-style sweepers. In the floor broom workshop, they will learn how to shape the long wooden handle as well as wrap the fibers.

“If you want to bring additional fibers, or beads, or little bones, those can be incorporated into a wrap,” Hawkins added.

He’s made brooms with decorative sprigs of lavender and sage, for example.

“Foraged fibers are welcome but not required,” he said.

Hawkins noted too that no previous experience is necessary, and all other supplies and tools will be provided in his classes.