Steve Tomlin Crafts

Spoon carving workshop in Northumberland

Posted on January 6, 2015 by stevetomlin

I have been invited to teach a weekend of
Spoon Carving at Catton, near Hexham in Northumberland on 21-22 Feb 2015.
The cost is £145 which includes all materials and lunch each day, to book please email me steve-tomlin[at]hotmail.co.uk
The two days will give you a full introduction to carving with axes and knives with a strong emphasis on safe working. You’ll go home with beautiful, useful utentsils, happy memories and the skills and confidence to keep making on your own.
Small groups ensures you’ll get lots of individual attention and my 12 years of carving experience mean that the workshop is suitable for those looking to improve their skills as well as for complete beginners.
In a lively, fun atmosphere we’ll cover the following:

Tools needed for spoon carving – what you need and where to buy it.
Materials – the best woods for spoon carving and how to make the most of it.
Efficient axe work.
Effective knife skills.
Hollowing the bowl using various techniques.
Spoon design.
Exercises to look after your hands.

Posted in greenwood courses, spoon carving, SteveTomlinCrafts | Tagged 2015, course, UK, workshop | Leave a comment

Scythe Poetry

Posted on January 5, 2015 by stevetomlin

A student on one of my Learn to Scythe courses sent me this poem a few weeks ago. I was going to wait to post it in the spring but it seems a great antidote to today’s misty grey weather. There’s a lot in these few lines and the analogy to dancing is perfect.
Martyn’s new collection of poetry ‘Sanctuary‘, written while Poet in Residence at Carlisle Cathedral is now available.

Scythe

His father had taught him the scythe’s angle:
‘Like dancing; same need for grace and rhythm.

‘It’s in the body; same need for poise and swing.
You feel it in your arms, same spring in your toes.’

Allowed to touch it now, like a girl’s hand. The same
initial shyness, as when the music started. As a child

he’d known its fear and sheeted potential for violence,
seen it carried with respect, crucially hung

with blade honed to a death’s edge, wrapped
in a sheath of newsprint bound with wispy twine.

He’d noticed shine where fists gripped stubby handles,
as if testing short horns before a cull or dipping.

Same combination of strength in wood and steel
as the sword behind glass, laid bare at the county museum.

‘Viking’, the label said, though the other story
was how they cut men like sheaves, then planted farms,

growing into their places artful with iron. Same
bending into blades as with his first permitted cut.

His father watched from a bench, enjoying the sun
patterning gravestones cut sharp with familiar names,

dates, and having handed on responsibilities,
hearing the blade breathe after daffodils were settled.

~ Martyn Halsall

Posted in Scytherspace | Tagged poem, scythe | Leave a comment

'Out of the Woods' exhibition at Farfield Mill

Posted on January 4, 2015 by stevetomlin

Later this month I will be part of a small group of craftspeople showing work at the ‘Out of the Woods’ exhibition at Farfield Mill near Sedbergh in Cumbria. This follows on from the previous successful Working Woodlands exhibition from a couple of years ago.
This year I will be showing my new range of hand carved kitchenware which will be available on my website later this year. My new cherry eating spoons will be there as well as some new products which I’m excited about.
The exhibition runs until 15 March 2015 with the preview on 18 Jan and is a perfect day out for these winter days.

Directions to Farfield Mill

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged cumbria, exhibition, Farfield Mill, greenwood | Leave a comment

Carving eating spoons

Posted on December 13, 2014 by stevetomlin

A few photos from the last week taken as I’ve been carving my eating spoons. They’ve proven very popular and I’m especially pleased to have got so many orders from other woodworkers and spoon carvers. The cherry wood is carving beautifully and it’s nice when carving spoons to the same design to see the subtle differences in grain and form which makes each one personal.
These spoons are available from my blog at a special winter price so if you’d like to order go through to this eating spoons post.

Posted in spoon carving, SteveTomlinCrafts | Tagged carved, cherry, eating spoon, handmade, wooden | Leave a comment

New Cherry Eating Spoons

Posted on December 3, 2014 by stevetomlin

I’m really pleased with these new eating spoons. I’ve been refining the shapes and style for a long time now and finally happy with the combination of simplicity and design in these.
The generous teardrop bowl is really satisfying, both to carve and to eat from and they’re well balanced by a handle with the smooth lines and classic shape I prefer. Add a hint of decoration at neck and stem so as not to distract from the beauty of the wood and either finish with a finial or leave the end clean.

I like these spoons so much and I want them to be used so I’m offering them to readers of my blog at a special price. Use the buttons below to order, valid until 30th Jan 2015 (That gives you a chance to order for Christmas or use any money you receive for a gift for yourself. It’s also my Mum’s birthday so easy to remember).
Update: Thanks to all the people who bought these spoons during the offer and to those of you who wrote to say how much you’re enjoying using them. These and my other handmade wooden spoons, for cooking and eating are still available – why not take a look?

Posted in spoon carving, SteveTomlinCrafts | Tagged cherry, christmas, cumbria, eating spoon, handmade, Sizergh, UK, wooden | Leave a comment

Medlar Jam

Posted on November 29, 2014 by stevetomlin

Medlars is one of those things that everyone seems to know about but nobody I know has done. The fruit, which gets called all sorts of rude things in other languages, needs to be ‘bletted’, ie left to over-ripen or partially rot before it can be used. There are two beautiful old trees here in Kendal and I always wonder how many people realise what they are. So this week I decided to have a go at making some jam
The fruit had started falling a couple of weeks ago which made collecting the medlars easy and had given them chance to start bletting. They feel should feel squishy, kind of the opposite from how you’d normally select fruit.
medlars
Once you start to chop them up, they don’t look so promising:
Even less so after they’ve been boiled for an hour:

But, surprise surprise, the resulting juice makes a beautifully coloured, clear jam with a distinctive, fruity taste. Well worth the effort.

Posted in SteveTomlinCrafts | Tagged jam, jelly, medlar | Leave a comment

Wooden birds and brushes for Lancashire Woodcarvers

Posted on November 25, 2014 by stevetomlin

What do you do when you’re invited to give a demonstration and teach an afternoon workshop for 15 hobby woodcarvers? Earlier in the year I was asked to do just that for the Lancashire branch of the Woodcarvers Association and decided to give them something they’d never seen before.
I started the day by talking about my work including how and why I make in the way I do. Carving with an axe was an eye-opener for lots of them and I explained my preference for having fewer tools which I have mastered and how this frees me to be creative with what I make. Something we shared in common was a preference for a tool finish without sanding which gives my work a much more tactile and natural finish.
My demonstration for the morning took the group through the process of how to carve a fan bird. They guessed correctly that I would split rather than saw the feathers but were still nicely amazed to watch the wings take shape as I bent them into place.
For the afternoon workshop I had promised ‘something completely different’ and think that the session on making wooden brushes fitted the bill. The bristles for these brushes are pulled from a stick, building up into a head which is still attached to the stem and finished with a string band. After some initial good-natured frustration while they learned the technique they got on and everyone finished at least one brush with enthusiasm and plenty of banter.

A terrific, friendly bunch of people and a lovely way to spend the day. If you’re nearby and interested, visit their website for more information.

Posted in fan birds, greenwood events, SteveTomlinCrafts | Tagged association, brush, fan bird, greenwood, lancashire, woodcarving | Leave a comment

Peening scythe repairs for lost tension

Posted on October 10, 2014 by stevetomlin

At the Scythe Festival this year I made a request for blades which had been over-peened and, as a result, lost their tension. This is not a common problem but one which causes big problems for mowing with the blade. I learned to repair this while working with peening experts in Austria and, as the only person in the UK with the experience to do it, I was keen to practise and also pass on the knowledge.
In response to my request I was offered a challenge by none other than Simon Fairlie, the festival organiser, who had lost tension in his favourite, antique blade. He was keen to have it repaired but cautious of the problem getting worse so we made a bet as to whether I could improve the blade for him.
With assistance from Christiane Laganda I set about carefully hammering the body of the blade to stretch it and restore the tension. Everyone was slightly nervous and so we didn’t photograph the process but suffice to say that Simon was pleased, mowed with the blade in the team event and I won the prize money which I promptly spent on a 95cm vintage blade of my own.
Later in the day my mate Kevin Austin from Cornwall asked me to repair one of his blades and I was able to guide him through the process of doing it himself to begin learning the skills too.

Posted in peening & sharpening, Scytherspace | Tagged peening, repair, scythe, tension | Leave a comment

Learn to peen a scythe workshop

Posted on October 5, 2014 by stevetomlin

I’ve just taught the second of two Learn to Peen workshops for the Yorkshire Dales National Park. I’ve been teaching people how to mow with scythes in the park for a couple of years so it was thought that some specific peening courses would be useful to give some of those people confidence in peening which they could then pass on and spread through the networks we’re hoping to build here in the NW.
I recommend that everyone starts to learn to peen using the peening jig. This gives you the opportunity to learn to handle the blade and strike consistently with the accuracy built in for you. Once you’ve learned these basic skills and understand what is happening with peening, it is much easier to move on to freehand peening on the anvil if you want to.

We started out with a recap of what peening is, how to judge when to peen and how the jig works, then we set everyone up and the hammering commenced. When you know how to handle the blade and what results to look for, peening with the jig is a relatively simple operation but one that can produce excellent results including an edge that will pass the ‘thumbnail test’ for meadow blades. With some encouragement, checking and slight corrections to technique, everyone was peening well by the end of the days. Like mowing itself, peening is a skill which needs practise and time to master but these folk are off to a good start.

Posted in peening & sharpening, scythe courses, Scytherspace | Tagged Austrian, course, jig, peening, scythe, UK, workshop | Leave a comment

In The Flow at Sprint Mill

Posted on September 24, 2014 by stevetomlin

As well as two weeks of art and craftwork on display, our C-Art Open Studio exhibition hosted a fantastic night of spoken word with some fantastic pieces inspired by Sprint Mill.

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