Fred Aldous

Each year, the National Festival of Making commissions a unique artist-led window installation at Fred Aldous, a long-established arts supply store in Manchester’s Northern Quarter.

This project transforms the shopfront into a celebration of creativity, showcasing a wide range of making activities and materials.

With the timeline of the annual presentation designed to align with the promotion of the National Festival of Making, the installation gives artists a platform to explore their own creative practice and the festival ethos, offering opportunities to test new ideas and experiment with different ways of working.

Over the years, we have worked with four artists and collectives to bring the window to life. Each opportunity has offered a unique creative output, commissioning artists at different stages of their careers and celebrating the diverse approaches to making.

Supermarché

Inspired by the quote “Light is like water, you turn the tap and out it comes” by Nobel Prize-winning Colombian author, journalist, and screenwriter Gabriel García Márquez, design duo Ben Hall and Charles Kondras, working under their studio name Supermarché, took over the Fred Aldous window for a weekend in 2019.

They transformed the shopfront into a micro-studio where passersby could stop, watch, and peek into the world of screen printing and ceramics as their work came to life.

Hollie Fuller and the Family of Makers

Hollie’s creative vision was inspired by the 2023 festival programme, and her unique, playful style was brought to life in the design of the Family of Makers.

Using hand-drawn illustrations, the window display highlighted both the activities available during the festival weekend and the products on offer in the store.

The Family of Makers featured potters, painters, photographers, and more, celebrating the creativity of the festival community.

Website

Ren Wolfe and the Garden of Making

In 2024, we teamed up with artist Ren Wolfe to create a fantastical window display.

Ren crafted a surreal, whimsical world where imaginative creatures and making tools emerged from a magical landscape.

Using recycled materials such as bed sheets and cardboard, she built a playful jungle wonderland, transforming everyday objects with paint and glue into something truly extraordinary.

Website

Monument to Making with MikeSian Studio

Designstudio MikeSian gave Fred Aldous’s window a bold new look in 2025. The display was transformed into a Monument to Making, meticulously handcrafted and sculpted from G.F. Smith paper.

Its striking colour-blocked design celebrated what it means to be a maker, the act of making itself, and the full spectrum of every maker’s experience: the doubts, the late nights, the small victories, and the lessons learned along the way. It reflected not only what making means to us, but also what it can achieve.

Website

About Fred Aldous

Fred Aldous has been helping people make things since 1886. Over five generations later, the business continues to thrive, committed to supplying materials to makers of all kinds.

Beyond their shops, they have nurtured a vibrant community of artists and customers, becoming a beloved staple of the creative scene.

Website

For the design, we wanted to focus on what making means to us, and to be honest, we really just wanted to make something that we wanted to make… something 3D, bright & bold, that felt really true to us.

MikeSian Studio

Photos by Emma Colbert-Mooring and Liam Chilton