Creative Crafts Council 35th Biennial Exhibit = WOW!

The 2025 Creative Crafts Council (CCC) 35th Biennial Exhibition presents 169 outstanding artworks by craftspeople from the Washington DC, Maryland and Virginia region. See top crafts in ceramics, enamel, fiber, glass, metal, mixed media, wood, book arts, and jewelry and wearable art. On March 14, 2025 36 artworks received awards for their makers’ outstanding efforts. 

Jurors for the 2025 CCC 35th Biennial wave to the audience at Strathmore Mansion. L-R: Michael Janis, Mary Higgins, Robert Devers.

Washington Glass School was well represented, with works by Kate Barfield, Erwin Timmers and April Shelford included in the exhibition.

1st and 2nd place winners of the CCC Best Glass category: Janet Wittenberg and WGS’ Erwin Timmers
April Shelford’s work Fossil won Honorable Mention

Saturday March 29, and April 26, 2025: Meet the Makers – come meet crafts people from the CCC Guilds and learn more about their crafts at the Strathmore Mansion 11am-1 pm

35th Biennial Creative Crafts Exhibition of Fine Crafts ​
Saturday March 15 – Saturday May 24, 2025

The Strathmore Mansion
10701 Rockville Pike
North Bethesda, MD 20852

Baltimore’s BLFTD Art Studios “The World Can’t Take It Away”. Opens April 3!

BLIFTD ART STVDIOS is an adaptive reuse initiative tasked with building a self-sustaining center for art and creative collaboration for the Baltimore community. BLIFTD is a non-profit, artist-run, co-working studio, gallery, performance space, and hub for peer-to-peer art education in Baltimore, supporting the area’s diverse communities. Located on Baltimore’s waterfront, BLIFTD provides space and programs for the visual arts, entrepreneurship, and community within the historic American Can Company building.

WGS artist John Henderson is part of the new exhibit “The World Can’t Take It Away”. Opening Thursday, April 3 · 6 – 8:30pm EDT

35th Biennial Exhibition of the Creative Crafts Council

Saturday ​March 15 – Saturday May 24, 2025

Thursday, March 20, 2025:   Opening reception and awards ceremony open to the public at the Strathmore Mansion 7-9 pm

The Creative Crafts Council (CCC) celebrates its 35th biennial exhibition supporting the finest crafts from Maryland, Virginia, and Washington, DC. The first biennial had bold beginnings as the Exhibition of Creative Arts at the National Collection of Fine Arts, now known as the National Museum of American Art, and today continues a long tradition of exhibiting at Strathmore.

The 2025 Creative the Crafts Council 35th Exhibition will showcase some of the finest artworks from the Washington DC, Maryland, and Virginia region, featuring ceramics, enamel, fiber, glass, metal, mixed media, wood, book arts, jewelry, and wearable art. The exhibition runs from Saturday, March 15, 2025, to Saturday, May 24, 2025, at the Mansion at Strathmore, located at 10701 Rockville Pike, Rockville, MD.

The Creative Crafts Council (CCC) is an umbrella organization of fine craft guilds that sponsors a juried biennial exhibition of artworks from regional fine craft artists at the Mansion at Strathmore in North Bethesda, Maryland, and supports and promotes craft-making across Washington DC, Maryland, and Virginia. The CCC’s exhibitions of regional craft have been held since 1954.

Meet the Jurors for the 35th CCC Exhibition

Michael Janis, Co-Director of the Washington Glass School & Studio, blends his architectural expertise with a disciplined approach to glass art, managing site-specific and public art commissions since 2005. His narrative artwork, inspired by his multicultural background as the child of Asian/Latino descent, is featured in major museum collections including the Art Institute of Chicago and the Tacoma Museum of Glass. Janis is the Lowe Art Museum’s 2024 Distinguished Artist, currently working on a public art memorial for the Enslaved People Who Built the US Capitol.
Robert Devers is an artist with a multi-faceted practice that includes ceramics, sculpture, painting, and photography. Ceramics remains his essential focus and provides the lens through which the other mediums are engaged and ultimately brought back into play in ceramic practice. Robert Devers received his MFA degree from Cranbrook Academy of Art. He is currently the Coordinator for the Center for Craft Studies at VisArts in Rockville, MD. He has taught at universities in Washington, DC and Maryland and has works in public collections including Smithsonian Renwick Gallery and the Manuel Cargaliero Foundation, Ravello, Italy.
Mary Higgins is an independent curator and consults with working artists on the development of their marketing and digital media presence through her consultancy, Distinct Studios. Throughout her career, she had maintained her artistic practice of drawing and exhibiting throughout the Washington DC region and internationally. She served for five years as a gallery director and curator for the Schlesinger Center at Northern Virginia Community College where she produced or curated more than 80 exhibitions including three site-specific public installations.

The Strathmore Mansion; 10701 Rockville Pike
North Bethesda, MD 20852