I’ve been carving staffs since I was eight years old. I’ve spent many happy days hunting for suitable trees. Searching through the hills, rooting through thickets, lying on my back with my cheek against a sapling sighting it’s trunk for straightness. It’s not easy to find the right sapling for …
The sun cuts low through winter trees, woodsmoke hangs in the air. Walking through the forest one day I find what’s left of a raven dance, the steps clear in the snow. I can see where a raven has scratched it’s beak back and forth drawing concentric lines. As part …
I rise before the sun, the scratchy radio voices catalog what bad things have happened in the world while I slept. But the world tells a different story– out the old farmhouse window the dawn blooms impossible colours against the somnabulant landscape. Two ravens sit warily in the orchard on …
I’ve just returned from a three-week trip to Britain. I taught a class about carving Iron Age ornamentation in wood, helped with a sword course that my friend Owen Bush was teaching and presented at a swordsmithing conference. Owens workshop and home “Bushfire Forge” is an amazing place to do …
I’ve had many requests to do a tutorial on handle carving, so I decided to document the carving of the grip on this long sword. It’s a long grip (11 1/2 “) so the process is a bit different than working on something shorter.First I will lay out the tools …