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25 Things You Didn’t Know About Crafts Beautiful

This year we’re celebrating a momentous milestone: it’s our 25-year anniversary! With so many issues behind us, we felt it was the perfect time to take a look back over the years and reveal a few of our little-known facts, figures and hilarious anecdotes. Do you have a Crafts Beautiful story of your own that you’d like to share? Pop us an email at cbfriends@aceville.co.uk – we’d love to hear from you!

1

Crafts Beautiful launched back in 1992 and since that date, we’ve produced around 300 issues!

2

The magazine first started its life under a completely different name… Create Monthly!

3

We’ve been lucky enough to work with some fantastic designers over the years – and some have been making projects for us since the very first launch issue!

4

With so many issues behind us, we’ve certainly learnt a lot over the years. Editor Sarah learnt the hard way one issue when she left out the salt in a salt dough recipe. Oops!

5

There’s nothing better than receiving a beautiful handwritten letter through the post, which is why our pen pal column has been a firm fixture for so many years. We’re thrilled to say we’ve brought together hundreds of crafters since our launch! Get involved by emailing social.cb@aceville.co.uk

6

Did you know that The WI have been working with Crafts Beautiful since late 2015? We’re so proud to work with the team and have introduced many of our readers to their local group!

7

We’ve featured projects from some of the top crafting celebs, including: Stephanie Weightman, The Crafty Beggars, Sara Davies, Mitch Turner MBE and Anna Griffin.

8

Our very first blogpost was ‘Seven Amazing Animals to Colour In’ – and the colouring trend is still going strong today!

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Our online community is a bustling hub of like-minded crafters. Why not join in the fun? We’re on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest. Stay tuned for some very special ‘takeovers’ coming soon…

10

The International Craft Awards is a key event on the Crafts Beautiful calendar – and it’s getting bigger every year. 2017 saw an incredible 40% increase in reader voting!

11

We’ve got a whopping 87 boards on Pinterest and it’s growing by the week! Each one is chock-a-block with crafty treats you’ll be just itching to recreate.

12

Our lovely designer Corinne Bradd can be seen flexing her crafty skills weekly via our YouTube channel. Why not pay her a quick visit?

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Featureflash Photo Agency / Shutterstock.com

Famous author Barbara Cartland and chat show host Jonathan Ross have both made an appearance in earlier issues!

14

Our wonderful readers have helped make the magazine what it is today – some of our subscribers have even been receiving the magazine for 23 years!

15

On Fridays, the Crafts Beautiful team will often be seen in stripes (and it’s not always planned!)

16

We’ve published around 20,000 card projects since our launch. That’s more card projects than any other craft magazine!

17

Over the years, we’ve given away a whopping £500,000 worth of prizes – you lucky lot!

18

Our website launched 12 years ago and we’ve been uploading weekly ever since. You’ll be spoilt for choice with projects, downloads and crafty freebies!

19

Over the years, we’ve included all sorts of goodies alongside the magazine. Editor Sarah’s favourite is a series of Paper Collections – and we couldn’t forget last year’s elf mini mag too!

20

We were the very first UK craft magazine to feature an exclusive interview with the American lifestyle guru and self-confessed crafter, Martha Stewart!