Learn | An Endangered Craft

Photography by Jeff Gilbert

Taking up a new craft is a delicious challenge and something that helps us feel we’re growing and developing. So imagine the glow of taking up a craft that is in danger of dying out. 

In our November issue, we met Elizabeth Ashdown (pictured above), who practises passementerie, the craft of making ornamental embellishments. She’s the youngest of only six people practising this craft in the UK, which inspired us to find out which other crafts were in danger of becoming extinct. 

Below are a list of crafts that Heritage Crafts have on their ‘critically endangered’ crafts list. Click on each one for information from Heritage Crafts on training opportunities, number of practitioners and more. You might be inspired to take a course or simply give it a go yourself. 

Critically endangered crafts

The crafts listed below are considered to be at serious risk of dying out in the UK (Heritage Crafts also a category of crafts that are only regarded as ‘endangered’. Crafts that are critically endangered might be due to a lack of craftspeople, reduced opportunities for training, being financially unviable or simply that there is no longer a way to pass on the skills and knowledge required. 

• Arrowsmithing 

• Basketwork furniture making

• Bell founding

• Bow making (musical) 

• Bowed-felt hat making

• Chain making 

• Clay pipe making

• Clog making

• Coiled straw basket making

• Coppersmithing (objects) 

• Compass and navigational instrument making

• Copper wheel engraving

• Currach making

• Devon stave basket making

• Diamond cutting

• Encaustic tile making 

• Engine turned engraving

• Fabric pleating

• Fair Isle chair making

• Fan making

• Flute making (concert)

• Fore-edge painting

• Frame knitting

• Glass eye making

• Hat block making 

• Hat plaiting

• Hazel basket making

• Highland thatching

• Horse collar making

• Horsehair weaving

• Industrial pottery

• Linen damask weaving

• Maille making

• Metal thread making

• Millwrighting

• Northern Isles basket making

• Oak bark tanning

• Orrery making

• Paper making (commercial handmade)

• Parchment and vellum making

• Piano making

• Plane making

• Plume making 

• Pointe shoe making

• Saw making

• Scientific and optical instrument making

• Scissor making

• Sieve and riddle making

• Silk ribbon making 

• Silver spinning

• Spade making (forged heads)

• Spinning wheel making

• Sporran making

• Straw hat making 

• Sussex trug making 

• Swill basket making

• Tinsmithing

• Wainwrighting

• Watch face enamelling

• Watch making

• Whip making 

• Withy pot making

• Wooden fishing net making

You can read about Elizabeth and her passementierie in our November issue, as well as others who are doing their best to save beautiful and rare things from extinction, from languages to red squirrels. Turn to page 66 to read The Preservation Society. 

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More from our November issue…

More crafts to try today…

Learn something new | Arm Knitting

In our January issue, we have the instructions to make this lovely arm-knitted blanket. The pattern is by Woolly Mahoosive where you can also buy chunky yarns for arm knitting. Visit woollymahoosive.com. If you’re having trouble getting started, watch this video from Woolly Mahoosive, which should give you a visual idea of how it arm knitting works and help you make sense of it all. You can buy the January issue of The Simple Things in all good shops and supermarkets or from our online store.

Make | Candle Holder

Light your way to bed with this easy-to-make, no-kiln-required clay candle holder

This elegant candle holder is really easy to make with just a couple of inexpensive craft purchases. It’s one of three candle holder makes created by our talented Simple Things duo, Karen Dunn and Joe McIntyre. You can find the instructions for the other two in our January issue to add a bit of glow to dark January evenings.

You will need:

Air-drying clay
Rolling pin
Craft knife
Ruler, paper, pencil and scissors
Water
White acrylic paint
Clear matte varnish, optional (we used Mod Podge)

How to make:

1 Roll out your air-drying clay so it’s around 5mm thick. Next, draw a circle on your paper (9cm diameter – you can use a mug or tin to draw around if you don’t have a compass). Then draw a 12 x 1.5cm and a 30 x 1.5cm strip and cut out.Place your templates on top of your clay and cut around them with your craft knife. Cut two of the 12cm strips. If your clay is quite wet, leave it to dry out for around 30 mins.

2 Next, score the outside edge of your circle of clay with a craft knife and add a fingertip of water. Wrap the longest of your clay strips around the outside edge and press firmly against the sides. Next, score across the join and smooth together with your fingertips

3 Take one of your smaller strips and in the middle of the clay base create a smaller circle with the strip (make sure this is bigger than the base of your candle as the clay will shrink as it dries). Once you have made a ring with the strip of clay, score the bottom, add a fingertip of water and press the edge of the strip down gently to attach in the middle of the base.

4 Take your final strip of clay and lay it across the base of the circle – from the central ring to the inside edge of the outer strip of clay. Loop the strip over your finger and, using the same method as before, secure it to the outside edge. Allow the clay to dry for around 24-48 hours.

5 Once dry, paint your holder with acrylic paint. Then, when completely dry, cover with a layer of matte varnish for a protective finish.

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More from our January issue…

More things to make on winter afternoons…

Makes: templates for paper flowers

Give spring a little nudge and add colour to your home with a bit of simple paper floristry

If spring flowers can’t come soon enough for you, why not lead the way with some pretty paper versions? In our February issue, we have some easy-to-follow instructions on how to make paper bluebells and cherry blossoms taken from The Paper Florist: Create and Display Stunning Paper Flowers by Suzi McLaughlin (Kyle Books, out 25 February). They’re really simple; all you need are a few basic craft bits and the templates here. Just click to download the PDF templates, print them off and you’ll soon be adept at paper floristry yourself. And not an oasis in sight!

Cherry blossom template

Bluebell template

You can find all the instructions on p118 of our February ‘Soothe’ issue. But if you’re itching to get started now, why not try our project for paper lily of the valley on our blog?

Lily of the valley template

More things to make…

More from our February issue…