Crafts in the English Countryside: Towards a Future
Edited by Professor EJT Collins
Following the publication of Crafts in the English Countryside: Towards a Future, this site provides an on-line executive summary of the report (the summary is entitled English Rural Crafts, Today and Tomorrow) as well as various appendices that support the full publication. The online Executive Summary and the appendices are available via the menu on the right-hand side. The full report is available in full-colour book form and costs £20, see how to order.
Greenwood Crafts: Market Trends Report May-June 2005
This report is based on information supplied by 36 informants across England in the period 5 May- 22 June 2005. It can be downloaded as a PDF from the website and can be found in the appendices section under Woodland and Basketry Crafts.
About the report
This landmark publication examines the state of the traditional crafts and trades in the English countryside. The first major survey for nearly 80 years, the main report draws on the knowledge and expertise of many leading authorities on the traditional rural crafts. Crafts in the English Countryside: Towards a Future is edited by Professor EJT Collins, a leading agricultural historian and former director of the Museum of Rural Life at the University of Reading.
This topical study fills a huge gap in our knowledge of traditional rural crafts. Accelerating social change has transformed the rural economies, and with it, the traditional crafts. For example, the gradual loss of the family firm has ended the pattern by which traditional skills once passed from master to apprentice down the generations. Ancient crafts have been lost, or barely survive. The same is true for local styles of workmanship, which helped give landscapes and communities their distinctiveness.
This lament for bygone skills is a familiar one. But Crafts in the English Countryside provides the all-important detail. Exactly which crafts are endangered? How steep is their decline and how uniform is it across England? Precisely what are the threats and what can be done to address them: is the problem a lack of new blood, poor or scarce raw materials, or is it foreign competition, especially as European enlargement starts to bite?
This study shows that the picture is not, by any means, all gloom. Some crafts are adapting to new markets and can hold their own. Which are they, and who are the new crafts-workers of today? Unexpected factors come into play, such as the buoyant country house market, the rise of ‘green’ consumerism, the influence of TV gardening personalities – even a welcome boost to besom broom making from the Harry Potter books.
Crafts in the English Countryside is a hugely impressive work, a comprehensive overview of the subject, fully illustrated with current and archive photographs. Crafts surveyed include: saddlery, farriery, wheelwrighting, blacksmithing, millwrighting, country-house gardening, basketry, and the woodland crafts, such as pole-lathe turning, besom and rake making. A major section examines the skilled crafts vital for restoring traditional homes and country buildings, such as pargetting, thatching, walling, carpentry, joinery and masonry.
Drawing on detailed surveys, Crafts in the English Countryside analyses the important contribution craftsmen make to the rural economy. It concludes with an analysis of skill shortages, recruitment issues, and the urgent need for better training. The survival of the crafts depends on their interests being represented at both national and local levels. It depends on government’s commitment to funding the right training to produce the skilled rural crafts-workers of tomorrow.
This important report is essential reading for anyone interested in our traditional crafts, and concerned that they should thrive for the enjoyment of future generations.