As usual, I'm a bit slow with posting this news.
10 Years ago as of October (ish) I finished my MA in Exeter, moved out to Dartmoor and set myself up as a knife and tool maker
I had no tools, no home, no money (having spent my saving on the masters degree the previous year). What I did have was good fortune and some good new friends who looked after me.
During the MA I was taught to weave baskets by a lovely lady named Linda Lemieux. Linda has a craft shop in Chagford (Wood and Rush http://www.woodandrush.net/) and I popped in to say hello one day whilst I was finishing off the MA. We got chatting about what I was planning to do when my studies had finished. A pie in the sky idea was to make knives and tools (it was a hobby of mine). She introduced me to her partner Pete (an endearingly mad Aussie wood turner) and we hit it off. Come the autumn I moved into a yurt in their back garden, shared a workshop with Pete (using his tools to begin with) and exchanged labour for rent.
Obviously I needed money, so I got a part time job in a local harware store until the new year when I realised that I didn't have enough time to devout to a part time job whilst trying to start a business. The job in Bowdens (the everything shop!) and working in Wood and Rush opened up a world of fabulous people as well as getting me started gently. A chunk of money was then loaned to me by the Princes' Trust, so that I could pay rent and buy materials without the need for a part time job
Since then things have moved on and progressed. I have my own workshop, with my own tools, set within 10 acres of woodland. I now teach courses in the things that 10 years ago I was just trying to teach myself. I'm a guest lecturer (sounds better than 'the bloke in the woods that they come and see once a year') and specialist advisor at Exeter uni and the masters program. Even though I don't sell much or do very much work locally anymore, almost every aspect of what I do and the people I make things for can be traced back to the folk that I met when I moved to Dartmoor
So, really I want to say a MASSIVE thank you to all who have supported me in making my hobbies into my job and allowing me to have not 'worked' a day for most of the last decade.
10 Years ago as of October (ish) I finished my MA in Exeter, moved out to Dartmoor and set myself up as a knife and tool maker
I had no tools, no home, no money (having spent my saving on the masters degree the previous year). What I did have was good fortune and some good new friends who looked after me.
During the MA I was taught to weave baskets by a lovely lady named Linda Lemieux. Linda has a craft shop in Chagford (Wood and Rush http://www.woodandrush.net/) and I popped in to say hello one day whilst I was finishing off the MA. We got chatting about what I was planning to do when my studies had finished. A pie in the sky idea was to make knives and tools (it was a hobby of mine). She introduced me to her partner Pete (an endearingly mad Aussie wood turner) and we hit it off. Come the autumn I moved into a yurt in their back garden, shared a workshop with Pete (using his tools to begin with) and exchanged labour for rent.
Obviously I needed money, so I got a part time job in a local harware store until the new year when I realised that I didn't have enough time to devout to a part time job whilst trying to start a business. The job in Bowdens (the everything shop!) and working in Wood and Rush opened up a world of fabulous people as well as getting me started gently. A chunk of money was then loaned to me by the Princes' Trust, so that I could pay rent and buy materials without the need for a part time job
Since then things have moved on and progressed. I have my own workshop, with my own tools, set within 10 acres of woodland. I now teach courses in the things that 10 years ago I was just trying to teach myself. I'm a guest lecturer (sounds better than 'the bloke in the woods that they come and see once a year') and specialist advisor at Exeter uni and the masters program. Even though I don't sell much or do very much work locally anymore, almost every aspect of what I do and the people I make things for can be traced back to the folk that I met when I moved to Dartmoor
So, really I want to say a MASSIVE thank you to all who have supported me in making my hobbies into my job and allowing me to have not 'worked' a day for most of the last decade.
I am gradually getting back to the academic side of my nature (having focused all of my energy building a business to put food on the table) and strengthening my links with the university in Exeter and archaeology. A few weeks ago I presented a paper on some iron age tools from Thailand to the members of the Historical Metallurgy Society (mostly academics and retired emeritus wotsits). I was introduced to them as a blacksmith on dartmoor who had helped a student with their research. The faces were a picture when I was able to not only give a good presentation on the artefacts that I had replicated but also the metallurgy and metalography of the originals. Very funny day out that one.
