2019 All wrapped up
The workshop is now closed and 2019 all wrapped up. However, I will probably squeeze in a bit of design time at home as I have a number of designs and ideas to launch in 2020. Reflecting on a busy 2019 reminds me just how much I’ve achieved and the workload I have managed to get through. Some great events which I attended, the IEWA Awards which I contributed to and some pretty cool visitors I had to the workshop.
Ouf ot the 100 plus designs that left the workshop this year, the Slate Wine Rack that stands out for me the most is this one pictured below which went to London, near Tower Bridge. It’s got a real presence, cored neatly in a linear fashion it has an exposed natural edge where you can really see the inner beauty of this stunning natural material. The splash of copper colour contrasts nicely with the dark grey slate. The gently curved top just rounds it off perfectly. This gets a straight 10/10 and I wish this was in my kitchen.
The Portland Stone Wine Rack which tops my list is this rack I delivered to South Wales, to an award winning kitchen, just in time for Christmas, just before 2019 all wrapped up. This is the fourth wine rack this client has purchased from me. Core drilled with rounded edges, complete with ‘Wine’ carved on the side and infilled with goldleaf. I have a number of blocks waiting in the workshop and I can’t wait to get started on these in the New Year. If you would like to commission one of these then please contact me now.
One of my favourite client visits of the year to the workshop has to be Carter Harris from Attitude Cycles who arrived on this Harley Davidson machine. This beauty was also on display later in the year at the Bike Show in the NEC. I like my bikes and hope to have one, one day, but I have never seen anything quite like this. It’s a work of art and sounds amazing and it’s on AIR !
I was also lucky enough to be invited deep down below Portland to see just how delicately Albion Stone remove the block from the underground mine. Mark the mine manager showed a few of us around and this was a great experience. The stone is used on a number of award winning projects but the way they extract this stone and how they leave their mark is a work of art in itself. A big thankyou to Pete at Naturehawk Photograpahy for this shot of me in my element.
Another little collaboration which worked out really well was with Sam at Compass Candles. Sam makes amazing candles and stunning scents from recycled bottles. I have hundreds of cores and Sam transformed some of these into candles which proved very popular. Sadly I ran out of stock just before Christmas so hope to get to work restocking these early in Q1.
Finally, with 2019 all wrapped up, I would just like to say a massive thankyou to everyone who liked a post, shared or commented on all my platforms across Social Media. A special mention to Pete and the team at Frozen Divide who I met online on Instagram. Loved the content they were pushing out and when I found out they did web design I knew he was the right fit for my brand. I hope to plan my time better down the workshop and record more of the process side of things and update my You Tube Channel much more. Happy Christmas and a Happy New Year to you all. Diolch !!