Steve Tomlin Crafts

Curach progress

Posted on February 26, 2012 by stevetomlin

We’ve had a couple more meetings together to work on the curach project which is coming along nicely. To bend the hazel couples into shape for the ribs we discussed the use of steam and bending formers. As the width and depth of the curach change over it’s length each pair of rods needs a slightly different curve so I suggested instead that we simply pre-flex the rods in the area of the bend and then shape them by hand and eye.

This worked well and with a little practise we had a good system for fitting the couples and adjusting them to match the existing pairs. It’s a two person job at least, one to bend and adjust the rods and another to sight down the boat. Much better is to have three people so that two can wrestle the couples together. The advice to look for ‘light and fine’ rods is dead right as they allow much smoother bends to be made and once coupled up are strong enough. An invaluable aid was a pack of heavy duty reusable zip ties that were perfect for clamping the couples together quickly and tightly. This part of the build, to master bending the rods smoothly, set the depth and shape of the boat as well as working to achieve sweet smooth lines along the hull is undoubtedly the most difficult and a steep learning curve. We thought of a few improvements to the techniques which we’ll use on the next curach.

The next stage is to bend more rods in for the stern and lash them, the couples and the sawn lath stringers in place.

Posted in kayaks & boats, SteveTomlinCrafts | Tagged boat, building, curach, currach, curragh, irish | Leave a comment

Greenwood & Scythe course dates 2012

Posted on February 21, 2012 by stevetomlin

My course dates are now set for the year. It’s always a juggling exercise to fit everything in, especially as I have again been asked to attend scythe course and events around the UK and Europe. This year I’m aiming to run courses in some crafts that are otherwise under-represented. I’m particularly looking forward to the weekend on birch bark when we will dispel the myth that British bark is not good enough for box making and which I hope will act as a springboard for a new movement in working with this lovely tactile material.
My courses are based near Kendal in the glorious Lake District. Sprint Mill is a terrific place in it’s own right, full of old tools, wood and inspiration. There is accomodation nearby to suit any pocket, from camping and hostels to 5-star hotels.
For more information, visit my courses page. To book a place, please send me an email.

Green wood workshops

Fan Bird Carving 27 May – £70
Working with Birch Bark 2-3 June – £125
Spoon carving 12-13 May as part of NW Coppice Association’s ‘Weekend in the Woods‘
Rake Making 3-7 september as part of NW Coppice Association’s ‘Woodland Pioneers’ week.

Scythe Courses

As well as greenwood work, I teach the modern art of mowing with a scythe on these popular courses in Cumbria and around the UK. For more information please visit scytherspace.

Learn to Mow with an Austrian Scythe 26 May, 30 June, 9 Sept 2012 – £60 per day
Scythe Improvers 11 Aug – £70
Improve your Peening 12 Aug 2012 – £60 Book both Improvers’ courses together for £115

Please note: you must be over 18 to attend these courses.

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Posted in greenwood courses, SteveTomlinCrafts | Tagged bark, birch bark, course, cumbria, fan bird, green wood, green woodwork, learn, north west, rake, spoon carving, workshop | Leave a comment

Willow chair seating

Posted on February 15, 2012 by stevetomlin

I wanted to learn how to weave the willow seat that I had found on the chairs made by David Drew. They had aged beautifully during their time in the Castle Drogo cafe and worn extremely well so I knew it was a perfect material.
In another nice turn to this story, shortly after moving to Cumbria, I met basketmaker Phil Bradley through mutual friends. Phil had first learned his basketmaking from David Drew and was interested in the seating himself so I lent him my chair to examine and organised for myself and Paul Girling, another green wood chairmaker, to go up to Phil’s workshop to learn to weave them together.
We had a fantastic weekend at Phil’s workshop in Cockermouth talking about chair design, basketmaking and craft in general while he took us through the steps of weaving the seat with white willow.
It was a learning experience for him too and, though he had worked out the main elements of the seat, there were certain points that we only figured out as we did them. Several times Phil was impressed with how David had designed the seat to give it strength and comfort while making the weaving process efficient.
The finished seat is neat and has a clean look with just enough decoration given by the waling weave at front and back which also gives the seat the strength it needs. The white of the willow contrast and complements brilliantly the black of the pickled oak and gives the a really modern look bringing the story very much into the present.

Posted in chair making, SteveTomlinCrafts | Tagged black and white chair, chair, David Drew, green wood, oak, pickled, willow seat | Leave a comment

Scythe Course dates 2012

Posted on February 7, 2012 by stevetomlin

My course dates and prices for 2012 are finally set, more details on the courses page:

Learn to Mow with an Austrian Scythe 26 May, 30 June, 9 Sept 2012 – £60
Scythe Improvers 11 Aug – £70
Improve your Peening 12 Aug – £60 – Book both improvers’ courses together for £115

All courses take place at Burneside near Kendal where I have access to lovely grassland on the edge of the Lake District. It’s a fantastic area to spend a weekend with accommodation to suit every budget.
For more information or to book simply send me an email with the dates you wish to book. I will then invoice you using PayPal which is very secure, easy to use and doesn’t require you to become a member of PayPal. Alternatively, you can pay by cheque if you prefer. Payment is required to confirm your place.
If you have an allotment, community orchard or gardening group then I can come and teach the group on your own land (you also get your mowing done!).
It’s going to be a great year, I look forward to mowing with you.

Posted in scythe courses, Scytherspace | Tagged beginners, course, cumbria, improve, learn to mow, learn to scythe, north west, peening, Scotland, scythe, workshop | Leave a comment

Pickled oak chair

Posted on February 6, 2012 by stevetomlin

So me and my Castle Drogo chair (the only furniture I owned at the time) moved to Cumbria. In time I decided that I would make this one-slat chair part of my new range of handmade green wood chairs. It had proven it’s comfort and I felt the classic Shaker style and simple design would make it equally suited as an office dining or cafe chair.
So I have made my own interpretation, altering the dimensions slightly, reducing the length of the back posts and raising the front rungs to lessen their chance of being damaged by people’s feet.
As a final touch I decided to pickle the oak to give the chair a contemporary feel when paired with the willow seat. Pickling oak is a simple process which I’ve used to good effect on smaller projects in the past. I dissolve a little steel wool in a jar of vinegar and then just wipe the clear solution on to the oak. At first nothing happens but by the time you’ve worked round to the third post, the first is turning a deep midnight blue like magic. The steel reacts with the tannin in the oak so it’s a natural colour which comes from the wood itself and leaves the grain visible.

Posted in chair making, SteveTomlinCrafts | Tagged black, black and white chair, Castle Drogo, chair, David Drew, green wood, ladderback, oak, pickled, willow seat | Leave a comment

Ransome's lawn mower

Posted on February 5, 2012 by stevetomlin

Here is the sentence you thought you’d never read on scytherspace: I’ve got myself a lawn mower.
This though, is no ordinary mower, it’s a Ransome’s Ajax push mower from the 1960’s with 12″ wide cutters, solid wood rollers and a heavy cast iron roller to the rear.
It has a steel grassbox, comes in gentlemanly green with racing stripes and is ‘by appointment to the Queen’! It needs a bit of tlc and it’s by no means a lightweight but it’s got heritage and was free so I’m not complaining.
So what do I want a mower for, no matter how sophisticated? Over the years of mowing, I’ve become increasingly interested in haymaking, traditional meadows and wild flowers. I’ve spent time in the mountains of Czech Republic and Transylvania making hay in flower-rich meadows, read about meadow management and discussed restoration projects with the North Pennines HayTime project. I discovered that Natural Enland has a ‘Wildflower meadow in your garden‘ booklet and started to learn about the cutting regime for traditional meadows. At the Somerset Scythe Festival last year, Dave Oxford gave a presentation on the new, lightweight breed of push mowers that are on the market and a project he did with them and Dorset council. I was impressed and immediately saw the potential in a scythe/ push mower combination for the ‘garden meadow’ idea.
To encourage wildflowers, the grass sward needs to be kept short in spring, traditionally by grazing with livestock. Around late May, the meadow is ‘shut up’ (the animals removed) and the grass allowed to grow until it’s harvested for hay in late July. In autumn, the ‘aftermath’ (grass regrowth) is again grazed off with the action of the beasts’ feet creating bare patches of soil for seed germination. Obviously, there’s no finer way to harvest your hay crop than by scythe but what about the spring and autumn short-cropping? Well, in skilled hands the scythe will cut this too. I well remember a group of National Trust wardens watching in amazement as my Oriental blade cropped the grass on their machine-cut lawn. For a lot of folk though, it can be frustrating and doesn’t give them the neat look they want. That’s where the mower comes in. Use it in the spring when you want a close shave lawn then sit back and watch the meadow grow until the end of summer when the scythe comes out for harvesting.
Of course, to have a flower-rich meadow where for years there was nothing but ryegrass and swingball takes a bit more effort than simply not cutting the grass so much. I’ve still a lot to learn myself so I’m continuing my studies and plan to organise some haymeadow training days in 2012. If you’re interested in these, please send me an email and subscribe to the blog to keep up to date with progress.

Posted in Scytherspace, tools | Tagged cumbria, garden, hay, lawn, meadow, mower, push mower, ransomes ajax, scythe, training | 3 Comments

Rescuing the Castle Drogo chairs

Posted on February 3, 2012 by stevetomlin

In 2008, a visit to a cafe set in motion a series of connections leading to my newest chair design.
I was at Castle Drogo, a National Trust property in Devon where I was living at the time. After a fairly ordinary visit to the castle, I was amazed on walking into the cafe to see hand-made chairs at every table. Simple and beautiful post-and-rung ladderbacks with a single slat and obviously made from green oak with a woven willow seat. After sitting and examining them over my coffee I went to find someone who could tell me more about them. A chap at reception told me they’d been made about 20 years before but he couldn’t remember the name of the maker. Anyway, if I liked them then maybe I could buy one, he informed me, as the Trust were about to get rid of them.
A week or two later the chairs were still in my mind so I went back to Castle Drogo with tools to measure, photograph and document them only to find a building site and levelled hole where the cafe had been. Fortunately the chairs hadn’t gone yet but were in a nearby farmer’s barn waiting to be auctioned off.
I thought this was such a shame to happen that I contacted the property manager and working with Linda Lemieux, a local basketmaker, we convinced the Trust that the chairs should be renovated and kept.
A couple of weeks in a damp barn had given the chairs a coating of mould, especially on the willow seats and it took several days to wash each one with hot water and a solution of oxalic acid, clean and reoil the woodwork and carry out some minor repairs. After 20 years of hard work in a busy cafe this amounted to two broken rungs, damage to the top edge of some slats and a few worn willow rods, testament to just how strong and durable green wood chairs are. For me it was brilliant to work on them all, handling each one and getting to see how the maker had used even wood which was slightly bent or curved around a knot in order to make the most from his trees. I imagined how it would be to shave the 200 legs, 50 slats and 600 rungs for them and the feeling of watching them take shape. I was so inspired that I decided to try and track down the maker.
The only other chair with a willow seat I’d ever seen was a ‘Somerset chair’ made by Tom Kealy a few years before. I contacted Tom who told me he’d learned the weaving from David Drew, a very well respected basketmaker, and had taught David chairmaking in return. Tom passed me on to David’s friend John Leach, the potter, who happens to live just by the site of the Somerset Scythe Festival. So I called in to see John and got an address for David in France where I wrote to him with photos of the chairs and the story of the rescue. I figured, if I’d made a batch of 50 chairs and they were still being used 20 years later I’d like to hear about it so maybe he would too.
In return I received a lovely letter with a wonderful series of photos showing David, his wife Judy and daughter Jane making the chairs. They wrote that 100 chairs were made and took the three of them 2 or 3 months to make while they lived in a mercedes truck during a cold winter. Whatever happened to the other 50 chairs I’ve no idea.

At Castle Drogo now the chairs are used around the property for staff and volunteers. I have kept one for myself and when I moved to Cumbria with it the trail of connections continued. More of that next time.

Posted in chair making, SteveTomlinCrafts | Tagged basket maker, black and white chair, Castle Drogo, chair, David Drew, green wood, ladderback, National Trust, oak, willow seat | 6 Comments

Bowl carving one-to-one workshop

Posted on January 26, 2012 by stevetomlin

A great day today teaching Sam Robinson on a one-to-one workshop at Sprint Mill. Sam is a current apprentice on the Bill Hogarth Apprenticeship scheme, now in his second year. We’d been talking about various crafts a couple of weeks ago and he asked me to run a course to learn how I carve bowls and improve his technique.
We started by looking at some of my carved bowls and discussing the design elements involved, importance of balancing the bowl by knowing which areas needed to be left thicker and where it could be carved finer. Sam was also keen to see some of my spoons and the finish I achieve solely through carving and which he’s aspiring to.
Sam had brought along some birch logs which were really fresh and ideal for the project. Once cleaved in half with a froe we began immediately with marking out guidelines for the bowl and axing out a twist in the wood. I always start by establishing a flat surface for the base of the bowl. This makes it sit stably on the bench and acts as a reference surface for marking out the height and measuring the depth as you carve. Flattening the top surface at this stage is a lot of work that will then be carved away when hollowing.
These one-to-one courses are great fun to do as I can fit the content exactly to the student’s skills and learning goals. It also gives me chance to put in lots more information and ‘tricks of the trade’ that there wouldn’t be time for with a group. A quality final product comes from well thought-out design and I showed Sam some tips on marking out for the bowl shape before we got onto the adzing. From our previous conversation I knew was an area where I could really improve Sam’s technique and his efficiency in hollowing the bowl. Sure enough, after a short demonstration, the chips were flying and the bowl started to take shape. Working with an adze is fun and exciting; like the axe it can swiftly remove large amounts of wood but can equally, in skilled hands, work extremely accurately. When I’m carving, I like to work right up to the line and leave a smooth surface with the adze, so there’s only the refining work to be done.
Before that though, we flattened the top surface of the bowl then remarked our shape and did a little more work with the adze before moving on to using gouges and knives. I had brought a selection of tools that I have used over the years for carving bowls, explaining their pros and cons. I demonstrated how I push the wide gouge through the wood using my body weight and hand positions to add power which then leads to controlled cutting and a smooth finish. Sam is well used to working with tools of course and a quick learner so he quickly picked it up and before long had a bowl full of beautiful shavings. As well as the gouges, we used a selection of hook knives including one long-handled knife designed especially for bowl carving, cutting across the grain to smooth the bottom of the bowl.
The other area that Sam wanted help with was in defining the outer surface of the bowl. He had picked out one of my spoons he especially liked as inspiration for his design and I explained how the same principles of wall thickness applied to both the bowl of a spoon and a large bowl. With a combination of axe, gouge and knife he worked on defining the shape, learning for himself along the way the importance of the initial design stages and the challenges of marrying the sides, ends and handles together.
At the end of the day Sam took away a really well-made, good looking bowl but more importantly the practical skills in using the adze and finishing tools. He was already planning his next bowl as he left.
One-to-one sessions can be catered to your own goals but could include

Spoon carving and design
Hay rake making
Learn to carve fan birds
Make and use a shavehorse
Steam bending wood
Axe and knife techniques for various projects

A day with me in the workshop costs £150 including materials and use of my tools. Or share with a friend for £250.

Posted in carved bowls, greenwood courses, SteveTomlinCrafts | Tagged adze, apprenticeship, Bill Hogarth, Bill Hogarth apprentice, bowl carving, carving, coppice association, course, cumbria, green wood, green woodwork, greenwood, learn, one to one, private tuition, sprint mill, trough, workshop | Leave a comment

Crosscut Saw Jointer & Raker Guage

Posted on January 25, 2012 by stevetomlin

A flurry of posts this week which is unusual. There’s often lots going on but I don’t always get around to posting about them.
Anyway, today I got a stage further with my project to start properly using my two man crosscut saws with the arrival of a jointer/ raker guage which I bought online from America. This one is a ‘short’ jointer made by Atkins & Co of Indianapolis. It’s marked as being patented ‘May 5 74’ which, the more I think about it, could be 1874? Well, aside from a bit of surface rust, it’s in great condition and I’m pleased to see there is still a thin shim of paper under the raker guage plate where the previous user set it up for his saw.

For sharpening, a flat file is clamped into the tool and bent to match the arc of the saw teeth using the screw thread. The file is then run over the teeth to file them all to the same length before they’re sharpened. The raker guage sets the distance below this arc of the raker teeth which clear the sawdust from the saw cut. I’m looking forward to trying it out.
There’s a lot of interest in two man saws here in the north-west of England and I’m planning to organise a day this year for people to get together and learn about their use, sharpening and maintenance. If you’re interested in taking part, send me an email steve-tomlin[@]hotmail.co.uk

Posted in SteveTomlinCrafts, tools | Tagged atkins, crosscut saw, jointer, raker guage, saw, sharpening, two man saw | 5 Comments

Blue spindleback dining chair

Posted on January 25, 2012 by stevetomlin

In between everything else I’m spending quite a bit of time at the moment on designing a series of chairs. I’ve been making green wood chairs since I did a course with Mike Abbott in Herefordshire in 2003. I did a short spell as one of the assistants on his courses before heading off to concentrate on my own green wood craft.
My chairs are post-and-rung frame chairs, often known as Shaker chairs after the american religious community that made and popularised the style. For my own chairs I’m working on slightly different designs, seating materials and finishes to produce a range of chairs with a traditional heritage but a contemporary feel. As always I’m experimenting with the craft and trying to push it forwards.
This chair is my first spindleback. It’s important to get the spacing and angle of the spindles right so the chair is comfortable; a centre spindle is definitely to be avoided as this is where your spine will sit. The chair is made from locally grown ash with steam bent back posts to tilt the back which gives support and comfort. It is painted with my own made tempera paint, a mixture of egg, oil and water as used in paintings by the ‘Old Masters’. I love how the paint has an organic, aged look to it with the grain of the wood still visible, as though this is a chair with history. To complement that feeling I’ve used ‘antique’ paper rushes to weave a traditional rush pattern seat.
These chairs are made to commission and cost £255 + p&p. Please email me steve-tomlin[@]hotmail.co.uk to discuss your requirements.

Posted in chair making, SteveTomlinCrafts | Tagged chair, contemporary, egg, green wood, Mike Abbott, paint, paper rush, rush seat, shaker, spindle back, tempera, traditional | Leave a comment

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