We are extremely excited to announce a collaboration with our soon-to-be Valencia St. neighbors, 826 Valencia! As stated on their website, 826 Valencia is a nonprofit organization that provides writing and tutoring assistance to students aged 6-18, with the belief that strong writing skills are crucial to future success. Their offerings include evening and weekend workshops designed to sharpen writing skills and foster creativity — which is where we come in!
All throughout the month of June at 826 Valencia, Alice and I will be leading a free writing workshop based around the theme of — what else? — chocolate. We’ll be teaching students all about the chocolate-making process, and using that as a springboard for them to come up with their own chocolate-inspired literary or artistic creations, be they in haiku, short story, poem or pictorial form. These student writings will be collected and published in a chapbook, which will be available at our factory space as well as the Pirate Store.
If you know of any young writers or chocolate enthusiasts who would like to participate in our workshop, they can sign up here. It’s a 4-week workshop, with each session held from 6-8 pm on Wednesday evenings. The first one starts next week, June 6. It is free to sign up and participate; the only stipulation is that you have to be between the ages of 12 and 15. Oh, and you have to love chocolate. It would be wonderful to see you there!
Please stay tuned for other exciting collaboration news between Dandelion Chocolate and 826 Valencia! (Hint: You know who else loves chocolate? Pirates. Pirates adore chocolate. Entire pirate nations have been lost on account of chocolate.)
All images credited to 826 Valencia.
To sign up for our writing workshop at 826 Valencia, please click here.
For more about 826 Valencia, please click here.
To find out if there is a local 826 chapter close to you, please click here.
I just love it that you folks are collaborating with 826 Valencia, especially since you demonstrate with this blog that you can handle prose as well as chocolate, a rare combination of talents.
Thank you so much for your kind words! Writing is certainly an under-appreciated medium. We are definitely looking forward to working with 826 Valencia, and having this opportunity to give back to the community in such a unique way!
Sounds like a collaboration made in heaven! Those are some lucky kids.
As a Mission local and an 826 volunteer (and a friend to dark chocolate everywhere), I look forward to the day when your doors open.
Hi Jessica,
Thank you for your comment! The students have been writing some really great and creative pieces throughout the past few weeks. We’re looking forward to publishing them through 826, and sharing them with you in the very near future!