New Country Lane Market
Make it, sew it, bake it, grow it. That’s the motto for the newly-formed Makers Market at Country Lane. They are providing a creative hub for all things handmade and showcase some of the great artisans in our region. On every second Sunday in winter, you’re sure to find some treasures.
The first market was held on Sunday 28 April and the crew are settling into their new digs. It came about due to a change in bylaw requirements, meaning that stallholders trading along the lakefront were heavily restricted in how they were able to operate on a regular day-to-day basis. This change does not include the Queenstown Markets, which still continue to run each Saturday. Charlie Archer, Monica Banhidi, Jan Nicholson and Lorraine Ni Dhubhghall formed a volunteer committee – Monica first approached Country Lane to get the ball rolling for a Sunday market.
Tineke Enright and her brother Bruce Grant are the fourth generation guardians of the family’s Frankton property. They were really happy to have the market held there on Sundays. When Tineke got the phone call from Monica, they jumped on board and got the ball rolling.
“We’re wanting to support more small, local, boutique-type businesses – as opposed to chain stores. For us, the Makers Market was the perfect fit with everything we’ve got going on here,” Enright says.
Archer says they were stoked to be working with Country Lane as they align with what the markets are trying to achieve. She runs a stall selling her handmade copper and silver jewellery. The first couple of events have gained a lot of interest from locals as well as those wanting to get involved – one of the rules for stallholders is their items must be handmade.
“We’ve got a lot of people interested, our first one went really well and a lot of people wanted to come just to be there for that first one,” Archer says. “A lot of people go on holidays at this time of year, so we’re expecting June and July to get more stallholders. We’ve got a lot of regulars that go to the Remarkables Market and because that’s closed now, they’ve started coming to us. We did it on a Sunday because we didn’t want to compete with the other markets.”
There are currently about 50 stallholders on their books, with about 20 showing up each Sunday. The stalls range from food stalls and cakes, clothing, jewellery, plants, ceramics, hair braiding and artwork. They have musicians coming down to play as well.
“We just wanted to create a sense of community. There’s such a great arts culture here that we wanted to embrace that some more. There’s a lot of younger people that can’t get into the other markets when they’re full or don’t know how they can get into them, that have artwork at home that they do, even for mental health reasons – finding somewhere they can sell those things is quite nice.”
For those wanting to get involved, the process is pretty simple – you can email queenstownmakersmarket@gmail.com expressing your interest. The committee will get back to you with an application packet that asks more questions about your goods and how they’re made.
“It was amazing seeing how happy everyone was at the end of the first one! We're hoping to make this the next big thing to do on a Sunday in Queenstown,” Archer says.
You’ll find the Makers Market at Country Lane 10am – 3pm every second Sunday, so keep your eyes peeled on their Facebook and Instagram
@makersmarketcountrylane to find out when the next one will be.
