Courtesy of Jasmine Jones
Audio By Carbonatix
Denver boasts plenty of Instagrammable cafes, interesting museums and cute restaurants for date nights. However, when Jasmine Jones was searching for free craft groups, she couldn’t find any. So, she decided to start her own.
Jones is an accountant, avid crocheter and a TikToker who utilizes her account @cozyandcollected_ to spread the news about the Denver Cozy Craft Collective. She founded and runs the group as a space for crafters of all disciplines and skill levels to casually hang out and work on projects together.
She grew up as a military kid in Colorado Springs and found that building community was easy and happened organically there. When she moved to Denver, it was harder to make friends and find people who shared her interests. She was also used to attending free community events and didn’t find as many as she hoped for.
“ If people just want to do a cozy Sunday crafting, why should you pay for that? Why should you pay for community?” Jones says.
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She wanted The Denver Cozy Craft Collective to be a place where anyone, regardless of economic status, could find connection.
“I do come out of pocket with things,” Jones says. “I bring snacks. I do try to bring supplies as well, but that’s stuff that just comes from my heart, and I just love doing it.”
Jones sat on the idea for three years and posted a video this past August about hosting a craft meetup. The video garnered over 11,000 views and 256 comments. She asked viewers about their availability and landed on Sunday, September 21, in Washington Park for the inaugural meetup. “ It was actually the last day of summer, which made it more special,” she says. More than thirty people came to the event, including her mother, who is a Denver Cozy Craft Collective regular.
Courtesy of Jasmine Jones
During the events, Jones said she typically walks around and chats with crafters to make sure they’re comfortable.
“ It’s very social, it’s very communal, but if you are an introvert and you are shy, you definitely can sit in the corner and wait till someone (comes up to you.) It’s like in school where you like sit by yourself and then that one friend comes along,” she says.
There’s always a wide range of crafts happening around the room. Jones said one person makes lace and another embroiders for their cosplay costumes. She has also seen digital artists, painters and people working on junk journals.
All ages are welcome, Jones says she just asks that any crafters under 18 years old bring a guardian.
Jones hosted previous cozy crafting events at Washington Park, Woods Boss Brewing Company and public libraries.
She catered events to holidays like a Halloween meetup with spooky decorations and treats and a Friendsgiving meetup where people could swap supplies with each other.
For her most recent meetup on December 7, she hosted a toy drive and raffled off Michaels gift cards she purchased with her own money.
“ Part of building community for me isn’t just gathering people together and crafting, it’s how can we help the community as well?” Jones says. “People have been giving advice about, ‘Let’s make blankets for kids. Let’s do hats for the homeless. Let’s do different things to help the environment,’ so there’s so many things that we can continue to do.”
Courtesy of Jasmine Jones
She hosts meetups once a month, but hopes to eventually expand the number of events to twice a month.
Jones started a Discord to connect crafters for future meetups. She has made new friends and checks in with someone she taught to crochet. “ I absolutely love everyone. I actually miss them so much when we’re not doing meetups, which is why I want them more often, but I have to have respect and boundaries for myself and everyone else,” she says.
Jones is working to make The Denver Cozy Craft Collective a nonprofit, so she can take some of the financial burden off of herself. “ That makes it easier to get supplies, like if we want to do blankets for the babies, can we get those supplies for donation from Michaels or a local place that will give us a donation,” she adds.
She hopes to eventually host a retreat for crafters to relax and unwind from their daily lives. “We can have workshops and build on trauma release, exercising our body, flexing our muscles, so that way they’re still active for our crafting,” she says.
Jones also wants to help people in other cities establish collectives like this.
“ I would love to help people in their local states and cities do the same thing because everyone on my TikTok who doesn’t live here is like, ‘I want to come. I want to do this,’” Jones says. “If I can just facilitate that for other cities and maybe fly out there and participate one day, that’s my big goal is maybe The Cozy Craft Collective can be not just local to Denver, but everywhere.”
The next Cozy Craft Meetup is noon to 4 p.m. Sunday, January 4, at the Denver Public Library Sam Gary Branch, 2961 Roslyn Street. RSVP here. Keep up with the community here.
