Our New Home Takes Shape

Parents, teachers and friends of the Cardiff Steiner Early Years Centre have been busy painting, prepping, sanding and gardening to transform our new home in St Anne’s School, Crofts St, Roath.

The lovely former infants school closed in July as part of Cardiff’s schools reorganisation. When we got the keys on 1st September it had been emptied of equipment and furniture, and the space looked simply beautiful, bathed in sunlight and waiting quietly for the next part of its life.

With just five weeks to get the two kindergarten rooms, new parent and toddler room and hall ready for our Open Day on Sat 8th Oct, we  invited all our families and friends to come along and be a part of the transformation.

We set to work filling, sanding, cleaning and gardening with gusto, while our teachers and assistants looked after the children in the ‘old’ kindergarten on Iron St. It has been rewarding stuff…good fun, good people, good food, good work.

Everyone has pulled  together in a truly inspirational way, often going truly above and beyond the call of duty – putting in 12 hour days to make sure get the beautiful wooden floors are sanded and sealed and whisking up feasts for up to 20 hungry workers at a time.

We are now in our final phase of works. Plans for this week include sanding the floor of Sun Garden, painting the hall, and ‘lazuring’ the Kindergarten rooms. Lazuring is a paint effect used in Steiner Schools around the world where walls are painted with transparent radiant color.

It is described as “a spiritually oriented painting technique, the white surface behind lazure color reflects light back through the layers of glaze making the colors appear to be ‘in the space’ rather than simply on the wall … The combined colors in the lazure method weave an enlivening variety for the human eye and spirit. Never intruding, always inviting, the colors interplay with the subtle nuances of nature, creating a depth not normally present on most interior walls.

Lazure is applied in layers of paint prepared nearly as thin and transparent as watercolor, consisting of water, binder, and pigment. It is applied with a rhythmical movement using large brushes. The final color is achieved using varied colors applied in several layers, over a white surface.  Parents Liane, a professional conservation painter and decorator, and artist Zoe, will be doing the lazuring. (video demonstarting the technique)

Our Parent and Toddler groups have been running at St Anne’s since Monday 5th Sep on Mon, Weds, Thurs 10.00-12.00, and Tues 1.15-3.15pm. Our Kindergartens will move over hopefully just after Open Day on 8 October.

We plan to say our goodbyes to Iron Street, which has been our home for 7 years, in a gentle way. When the time comes we will pack the toys in trolleys and ask the children to carry their work baskets as with ceremony we close the door of Iron Street, walk to our new home and unlock the door together for the first time.