More..... Made in London Gallery

                      About The Crafts and Trades People

I am making a series of photographs celebrating independent Trades and Crafts People who make a living from their trade in London. As you can see in the Gallery, it is on going.

This project intends to remind us of the importance of independent trades and craft people today and to appreciate the value of vocational training and apprenticeships so we may have crafts and trades people among us in the future.

I am photographing both the well known and the unknown. All involved have a passion for what they do and are very proud to make a living from what they do. But the fact they are all independent and often one-man-band businesses makes them vulnerable. Once they go, they are gone, and all too often their craft will go with them. This isn't about grasping onto the past however. Yes, many of the trades and crafts are rare or endangered, but some are relatively common, some are being revitalised and some are new and blossoming. None should disappear without a trace.

From the links above you will find The Gallery and also a page About the Crafts People, containing some links, facts and thoughts about the trades and crafts people.

Independent crafts and trades people are a great barometer for both the cultural and economic health of a place and an excellent measure of its spirit.

Spirit? Look down almost any high street in the UK and you wont find it there. But you will find the very same chain shops, franchised bakers and homogenous cafes I can see in mine. Spirit is what all the small trades and crafts people bring to a place: individuality; identity; character; chutzpah; warmth; skill; knowledge; invention; the unexpected. It's something intangible, you can't put a price on it.

The irony is that often what a crafts person produces is very tangible. You can hold it. You can touch it, sleep on it, eat off it, you can put it in a museum. But that intangible thing the trade and crafts people also give to a community and a culture, slips between the gaps of memory and time, and when its gone its gone. Often the independents are the victims of their own success. The spirit they create attracts people and custom to the area they are in, these new customers attract more businesses, these businesses attract bigger and bigger businesses. The rates go up in massive increments, the small independents are forced to leave. The area is left, often well catered for, but spiritless. Your high street and mine. 

Even for a perfectly successful independent trade and crafts person, succession can be an insurmountable problem. While 100 other countries signed up for the 2003 Unesco Convention for The Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage, which implicitly included traditional craftsmanship and the transmission “of their skills and knowledge to others”, ie apprenticeships, Great Britain decided not to. Consequently it is very rare for an individual crafts person to be able to take on an apprentice, and so when he stops trading, his craft may well die with him, along with his unique knowledge and experience. The best legacy we can give to our independent trade and crafts people is an apprentice scheme, and that legacy will also be ours.

David Cameron has talked about using happiness as well as GDP to measure our wealth, using the Bobby Kennedy quote that GDP “measures everything, in short, except that which makes life worthwhile.” He is to a degree, talking about that same intangible benefit we have been talking about here. Kennedy’s quote ends with: “And [GDP] tells us everything about America, except why we are proud that we are Americans” which applies just as well in London, the UK, or anywhere else. Getting Trades and Crafts people back into the high street, protecting the areas they have created, and creating apprentice schemes will give us a more enjoyable high street, a busier high street and the trade and craft community more work and stability. This in turn may well help to improve both the GDP and that elusive happiness index.

This project aims to influence the aspirations of people of any age who come to see it toward work they may never have considered, be that a gunsmith or a florist, a violin maker or a micro-brewer. In this project, Duncan The Micro Brewer used to be an accountant, Lavine The Florist a banker, Mo the Tattoo Artist was on his way to a career in law. 

We can't all say that we love how we make a living. Why do many of us just "end up" in jobs? Why don’t we aspire to something we could get satisfaction from and could actually realise? Have our aspirations been skewed by our education, our sense of worth distorted by the media, our sense of value twisted by the ensuing culture? Trite and true, there’s nothing wrong with having a degree in media studies, fame and millions in the bank, but it's not the only path to happiness and fulfilment.

It's taboo to say right now, but you don’t have to, or shouldn’t have to, go to University to make a success of your life or to learn skills. Some of us simply don’t get along with formal education and if everyone has a degree, what is its worth to employers anyway? Vocational, manual skill college courses are often derided and seen as second rate (as are the manual jobs) . Apprenticeships are rarely seen at all and small trades or craftsmen get little help in providing them. But both can offer something as equally as valuable as a degree and often something more practical.

Skills courses and apprenticeships should be as well funded, respected and available to all as the ubiquitous degree. 

Ask someone who is in hedge funds what they actually do and you (and they) may never make sense of it. Ask what a watchmaker does, and he’ll tell you. He makes watches. He’ll show you the watch on his wrist and give you the time of day. 

More .....   Made in London Gallery

                       About The Crafts and Trades People