Quite an exciting month and busy! Which is always good (or so the bank account
says. Don’t think my body agrees!).
Well Billy is back! (With new bright white overalls! Just the ticket for a forge!) Don’t how much that means to any of you so I
will explain. Billy is the volunteer
apprentice at The Blacksmiths
Workshop Stepney City Farm and has had a couple of months off on a training
course (and yes he now has a sensible blue pair). Thankfully he hasn’t forgotten any of the
skills he picked up before he went.
Except how to put sugar in Tea/Coffee.
That said, he didn’t sus that before he went on the course. Anyhow, he has sold his first piece! Well done Billy, better at this blacksmithing
game than you thought aren’t ya?
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| Billy in Action |
The first Saturday of November was the Halloween festival at
Stepney City Farm and the
Halloween Crafty Saturday for those of us who have workshops in the Rural Arts
Centre at the farm. The festival was
more low key than in recent years, but the forge was packed all day with kids
basically bashing metal into shapes and generally making a lot of noise. Great Fun for the kids! Great fun for
me! This is one of the most enjoyable aspects
of my job. The kids’ enthusiasm and
sheer enjoyment at doing something risky makes it all worthwhile. The pics show that we did meet with some
success on the anvil. Hopefully you will
be pleasantly surprised.
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| Made by the kids on Crafty Saturday |
On a less joyful note I decided to quit the Foundation
Degree I was doing. Won’t go into
details but it just wasn’t for me.
Restoring and preserving historic ironwork is what I do and I prefer
being out on the ground doing it. That
said I did learn something amazing that answers a question many of us have
probably often asked! Did you know a
pass mark for a degree is 40%? Yes forty
fucking percent! It’s true! Now then, even I know that is less than half!
Enough ranting.
Did a small repair job at Burgh House Museum in Hampstead. A nice little place but needs some
renovation. There are lots of
regulations covering historic buildings and these small places have very little
money, so pay it a visit and leave a donation.
Lots of students on courses this month – www.blacksmithingcourses.co.uk
- including 2 brothers who came to an Introduction course, loved it that much
came back the next week! This month also
saw our first students on our all day Basic course. What a good day this was. A lot less hectic than the 2 hr Intro
course. Had them making fire pokers
which involved drawing a taper up to 8” long, although I wasn’t in a sadistic
mood so said they did not have to go that long if they wished not to. They ALL did!
What do you think of them? This
was also Billy’s first sessions helping with the teaching. Had the following feedback from a student on
that: “The teaching was excellent”. Billy is going to lead the course we are
running on the 10th.
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| Student drawing a taper on the Basic Blacksmithing course |
Two courses run this month for the farms Young
Volunteers. Hard work (but teenagers
always are!) but damm good fun. One even
gave us the very high praise of “yeah it wur alrite”. The missis, Lizzie, (and one of my very first
blacksmith students) helped with the sessions and really enjoyed herself. Might even think of paying her next time
(probably won’t but don’t tell her that).
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| Instructing Stepney City Farm Young Volunteers |
We have had yet another repair job come in for listed
railings from a church. Just like the 2
we have already done this year, this was also smashed by a vehicle. Read somewhere this week that the government
wants to change the driving test.
Fantastic! Here an idea: How about including vehicle control? I’m sure it was on the test when I did mine (nearly
a ¼ of a century ago…….Fuck time flies).
Opps……..rant No2 over, unless you’re reading this on the farm website
then its rant No1 (I’ll try not to do that again). Cast Iron posts and finials with a wrought
iron top rail. Interesting point about this
one. We were appointed by the insurance
company and were also the highest quote.
Don’t get a much better recommendation than that! More on this next month.
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| Broken main post and back stay from the Grade 1 listed 18th Century railings at St Johns Church Hampstead |
Well all that leaves to say now is that I hope you all have
a Merry Xmas (I’m a scrooge so don’t feel you need to say it back) and please
spare a thought for all our service men and women that will be away from their
families over the festive period deployed on active service, and if you can
spare a few quid donate to Veterans Aid
– Caring for veterans in crisis now.
Its hard work this blogging malarkey, but I’ll give it
another try at the end of December.
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