About

In The Making (ITM) are artist-educators Maia Walton and Tressa Thomas. We live and work in Plymouth, and have been working together since 2021, where we met as fellow MA students at Arts University Plymouth.

ITM believes in making things in order to make things happen. Our focus is on the process, not just the product – bringing attention to the sensing body and fostering meaningful community connections through creativity. We are committed to material-led making that encourages a deeper, more reciprocal relationship with the natural world, moving away from a capitalist mindset.

As proud members of MAKE Southwest's Green Makers Initiative, we champion sustainable practices in all of our workshops and exhibitions.

Past Projects Include:

  • Community-designed and installed mosaic at Stoke’s Blockhouse Park

  • Intuitive Sculpting workshops in schools, colleges, community centers, and galleries

  • ‘Points of Contact’ — our first solo show featuring the intuitive sculpting process and resultant sculptures at Ocean Studios in Plymouth

  • 'Things Fall Apart' – a group exhibition in collaboration with zero-waste shop and café, Almanac Café

Tressa Thomas

Tressa is a paper pulp artist and creative educator whose work focuses on the natural decay of waste materials. Her practice embraces the natural deterioration of these materials, using self-recycling processes to both reduce waste and inspire a sense of agency in response to our ecological challenges.

Tressa believes that as creatives, one of our most important tasks is to reconnect with our bodies. Her approach to making and teaching encourages participants to see material, space, and body as equal partners in the creative process, fostering a deep and mindful engagement with both the work and the environment.

Tressa holds an MA in Creative Education from AUP and works as a facilitator and educator at Devon and Cornwall Refugee Support, Black Mountains College, and Arts University Plymouth.

Maia Walton

Maia Walton is an artist whose sculptural practice is rooted in the sensuous materiality of clay. She creates visual expressions of sensory connections and imagined experiences, approaching each piece as an act of care. Maia works to cultivate a haptic relationship between her body and the material, allowing the process to unfold organically.

Her recent works explore the aesthetic of ruin and artifact—structures that evoke a sense of history, memory, and the traces of human presence, even in their apparent abandonment. Ruins have a unique way of offering both intimacy and distance, revealing fragmented glimpses of lived experiences. Maia embraces this tension, capturing the physical imprints of her creations and inviting viewers to sense the lingering warmth of what’s been left behind.

Maia holds an MA in Ceramics from Arts University Plymouth.