The workshop

The studio occupies a converted barn at the end of a chalk track, surrounded by hornbeam coppice and old hedgerows. It is a working space, not a showroom - sawdust on the floor, tools within reach, timber stacked along the walls in various stages of seasoning.

The centrepiece is a Vicmarc VL300 lathe, a machine built for precision work on pieces up to 500mm in diameter. Alongside it: a bandsaw for roughing blanks, a grinding station for maintaining tool edges, and a slow-speed sharpening system that keeps gouges and skew chisels at their working best.

The process

Each piece begins as a section of log, often still wet from felling. The wood is rough-turned to near-final shape, then set aside to dry slowly over weeks or months - rushing this stage invites cracking and warping. Once seasoned, the piece returns to the lathe for final turning, where wall thickness is refined to a uniform few millimetres and the surface is brought to its finished state.

Finishing depends on the intended use: food-safe oils for bowls and platters, friction polish for decorative pieces, or sometimes nothing at all - allowing the wood to develop its own patina through handling and age.

Timber

The studio works primarily with native British species: hornbeam for its pale density, oak for its strength and figure, ash for its flexibility and grain, elm for its wild, unpredictable character, and yew for its rich colour and ancient presence. Spalted timbers - wood marked by early-stage fungal colonisation - are a particular interest, offering patterns no artist could design.