Intangible Cultural Heritage in Scotland

In 2008, a team from Edinburgh Napier University, funded by Museums Galleries Scotland, undertook a scoping and mapping exercise in order to evaluate how a project to record Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) in Scotland would look. The full report can be found here.

Edinburgh Napier University has been awarded a substantial Knowledge Transfer Fellowship grant from the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) to bring the report's recommendations to fruition. The primary outcome of the project, funded primarily by the AHRC, and utilising the knowledge and expertise of Local Authorities across Scotland, will be the establishment of an online inventory of Scotland’s ICH, taking the form of a customised wiki.

This will record and preserve the aspects of Scotland’s culture that do not easily fit into museum collections. The data will be collected and inputted into the main database by teams across Scotland and will provide a valuable record of ICH, as it is currently practiced, and will be practiced in the future, across Scotland. The database is designed not to be a record of ICH at a given moment, but, rather, to be dynamic, in a way that mirrors its subject matter. ICH, on account of its nature, evolves in form over time, and the database must be of a form that is able to adequately capture this.

For more information, visit the Intangible Cultural Heritage in Scotland website at http://ichscotland.org.

ICON training bursaries

The Institute of Conservation is pleased to advertise the fourth year of its training bursaries scheme, with six 12-month internships starting this September as part of the four-year scheme supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund.

Additionally, Icon is advertising two of its own Internships in partnership with other employers and funders. Venues include private and public sector conservation workshops across the UK, offering experience in the conservation of archives, metals, stone, textiles, stained glass and photographic materials.

Closing date is 1 June 2009. Information on all placements and details of eligibility can be found on the Icon website at www.icon.org.uk

Debate the threat to rural skills - 22 May 2009, 4pm

Join Emma Bridgewater, Hugh Peachey, Mike Moody and Daniel Butler at the Hay Festival for the 2009 Country Living Magazine discussion: 'Thatcher, Farrier, Cooper ... Call Centre Worker?'

Rural skills are under threat, and without training for a new generation of craftspeople, the traditions we treasure will exist only in tales of days gone by. Chaired by countryside writer Daniel Butler, who talks to Hugh Peachey, gypsy wagon restorer and stonemason, Mike Moody, chair of the National Heritage Training Group, and entrepreneur Emma Bridgewater.

Click here for more information and to book. Sponsored by The Balvenie.

If you plan on attending this event, please send your reviews or comments to us at info@heritagecrafts.org.uk.

Traditional craftspeople wanted in Gateshead - 12 September 2009

Gatehead Heritage @ St. Mary's is having a heritage craft open day on 12 September 2009 and is looking for traditional craftspeople who may be interested in demonstrate their craft on that day.

If you are interested in taking part, please email Eva Larsen at evalarsen@gateshead.gov.uk.

Click here for more information on Gateshead Heritage @ St. Mary's

Gardeners turning to the rural craftsmen to sweep away gloom

This article was published in The Times on Saturday (25 April 2009), by Valerie Elliott, Countryside Editor.

The worst recession in 60 years might have hit the City hard, but the world of traditional country crafts is enjoying something of a boom.

Across Britain craftsmen who have been honing their skills without fanfare for years have experienced a sudden demand from people keen to hark back to bygone days.

A new awareness seems to be developing of the need to protect the environment, buy local and support traditional tradesmen, who make quality goods that are built to last.

Among the beneficiaries are John Rudd, 70, and his son, Graeme, 38, the last commercial rake makers in Britain. They have barely noticed the economic downturn and make up to 1,000 rakes a month at their workshop in Dufton, near Appleby, Cumbria, where four generations of the family have carried on the craft since 1890.

A hay rake made by them should last at least 30 years. Some rakes are still used for haymaking but most are used for collecting garden cuttings or sweeping gravel on drives and paths.

Mr Rudd senior, who has been making rakes for 54 years, is thrilled that he has seen off modern competition, though times were tough in the 1970s, when rakes were mass produced in aluminium and plastic.

He said: “We are lucky because golf clubs like them to clear bunkers and they are used for the sand on athletics tracks. Lots of people have bought them this year because of the snow. We just keep going and we are the only people producing them. We sell through wholesalers and they go to ironmongers and agricultural merchants, where they sell for about £20.”

Little has changed since Mr Rudd made his first hay rake as a six-year-old boy. Even the design with 16 teeth is the same. The fashion for allotments is also helping Kevin Skinner, 57, from Hailsham, East Sussex, who is inundated with orders for garden trugs.

“I have not been affected by the downturn. Gardeners could just use a plastic tray for weeding but trugs are something people adore. I am making 50 a week. People are also buying them for picking fruit and vegetables, collecting eggs and laying flowers. I have even sold them to pubs and restaurants to store napkins or cutlery.”

The past three months has also lifted demand for traditional brooms, or besoms. Mark Cottrell, one of the last traditional makers, who runs Oakwood Sawmills, near Reading, said: “I have done so well since Christmas I have sold right out of stock.

“I have hardly noticed the recession. There is definitely a trend for an original broom. It’s nothing to do with the Harry Potter effect. People just want the real thing to sweep up leaves. With all the interest in growing vegetables, the other side of my business has gone ballistic. I have never sold so many bean pods and pea sticks.”

Scythes are even fast replacing strimmers. There is no traditional scythe- maker left in Britain, but they are becoming so popular that Simon Fairlie, of South Petherton, Somerset, is importing them from Austria. “Scythes are cheaper than strimmers. With global warming, people are trying to cut down use of fossil fuels. Strimmers make a lot of noise and break down a lot. If everyone owned a scythe we’d get much quieter Sunday afternoons.”

Meanwhile, the decline in the use of plastic bags is driving sales of willow baskets at P H Coate & Son, of Stoke St Gregory, near Taunton. The company, which started in 1819, is based in the Somerset levels, which provides ideal conditions for growing willow.

Jonathan Coate, a director, said: “Business is very upbeat, especially for the wicker shopping trolley on wheels. People are going off the plastic ones and we think more people are shopping locally instead of using the car. We are noticing that people don’t mind paying a little extra for something grown and made in the UK.”

Tom Perkins creates logo for the Heritage Crafts Association

Tom Perkins is an Honoured Fellow of the Calligraphy and Lettering Arts Society who is a world-renowned letter cutter and designer, and whose work has graced a number of public buildings. He was the first choice of designer as someone who would be able to create a forward-looking logo for the Heritage Crafts Association, and who also encompasses all the elements of a skilled craftsman at the very top of his profession.

Tom's letters are always hand drawn. For the Heritage Crafts Association logo, Tom started by just doodling and playing around with the letter-forms. These particular letters didn't create too much of a problem, as the ascender on the letter 'h' and the last letter 'a' could both be flourished (sometimes the letter configurations are very challenging).

These were then worked up into thumbnail sketches, and Tom created quite a few for the committee to choose. In the end, they chose the one which had an extension to the letter 'a' that encased the three letters HCA to look a little like an @ symbol. Tom then worked this up to a full design, which will be used on all Heritage Craft Association literature.

Tom's other work:

• The letter 'd' is a piece now in the Fitzwilliam Museum Collection of Contemporary Calligraphy in Cambridge, and is reproduced by kind permission of the Syndics.
• The shining letters are stainless steel, cast from letters designed by Tom for St Martin-in-the-Fields.
• The roundel with gold letters is a v-incised and gilded Welsh slate.

Closure of the Textile Conservation Centre

The Textile Conservation Centre was founded in 1975 by Karen Finch OBE and was based at Hampton Court Palace for nearly 25 years. It is of international importance having trained over half of the textile conservators working in the world today.

In 1998, the Centre merged with the University of Southampton, one of the UK’s top research-led universities, and in 1999 relocated to a purpose-designed building on the University's campus in Winchester. Now, less than ten years later, it is set to close.



Speaking on behalf of the Foundation, Peter Longman, Deputy Chairman, said ‘this closure will have serious implications for the conservation and museum sector in terms of career-entry education, CPD and research.' The TCC Foundation will continue to make every effort to ensure that the TCC's work, accumulated knowledge and expertise will not be completely lost as a result of the University of Southampton's closure decision.

Time will be made to celebrate the huge achievements of the Centre, and that end the TCC is organising two open days (18 and 19 June 2009) for supporters, former clients, graduates and the Centre's friends to see the work of the current staff and students for one final time before closure. A major reception will also be held in London for those who have funded and supported the TCC over the past 34 years.

For more information about the closure or about the TCC's June Open days please contact Nell Hoare, Director of the TCC, at tccuk@soton.ac.uk.

www.textileconservationcentre.soton.ac.uk