About.com
Crafts enthusiasts with a week's holiday to spare should begin their research at About.com. Twenty types of craft have their own web guide. Much of the information has a US bias, but this is no disadvantage if you're heading for North America.

La Antigua
The art workshops in La Antigua offer morning classes in Guatemalan crafts, painting, and textiles. The afternoons are free to learn Spanish, climb the nearby dormant volcanoes and slumber in hammocks. A 10-day package starts at $1,175 plus flights.

Vissinggaard centre
Back in Europe, the Vissinggaard centre specialises in basketry. A forested estate in the middle of Jutland in Denmark, it offers accommodation and courses.

The teaching, which is conducted in English and Danish, is led by energetic blonde Eva Seidenfaden, who also grows her own willow on the estate.

Candili
If your knowledge of pottery consists of a passing acquaintance with Ode to a Grecian Urn and memories of clay-kiln disasters in art lessons, a ceramics course with Candili may help. The 10-day holiday in September costs £515 and includes accommodation on the Candili estate on the Greek island of Evia. Other recent courses include mosaics, and painting on silk and velvet.

Montmiral
The Painting School of Montmiral offers courses in the beautiful Tarn region of south-west France. Visitors stay in a 13th-century hill-top bastide.

Bruce Luckhurst
Most British arts-and-crafts sites have an amateur feel. One craftsman who does succeed in conveying the nature of his work on the web is Bruce Luckhurst. He offers short courses in Britain, Ireland, Sweden and Norway, teaches marquetry, wood finishing, and cabinet making, but you must arrange your own transport and accommodation.