Date 20-21 July 2024 (2 Days)

Price £260

Maximum number of places 16

Book Contact Liz Watson email hello@ellekerswood.com or phone 07985 548481

Course Details

Not one, but two esteemed spoon carvers to teach you, over the course of the weekend; You will spend a day with each expert tutor, exploring the art of spoon carving without templates.

Deborah will be teaching how to make a pocket spoon. Her practice stresses the importance of drawing (without a template) as a way of developing imagination and enhancing perception. She will also emphasize learning to use tools confidently (safely) to make a better spoon!

Jan Harm will teach you to carve simple and systematic straight spoons with knife and axe, and crooked Swedish type spoons from ‘sidebranch crooks’- a journey by eye, hand, and tool through fresh wood- No drawing, no template, beginning with simple steps that are easy to remember and easy to envision- so you can explore by yourself and make more afterwards.

Catering:

For all courses, a hearty, healthy lunch is provided (please let your tutor know of any dietary requirements when booking), along with tea, coffee and water. Breakfast and evening meal is self-catered, with firewood and charcoal-based cooking available.

We also provide firewood, brew-kit, washing up and cooking facilities, crockery and cutlery. 

Guests should bring; barbecue food or pans for cooking on a fire for breakfast and evening meals.

Facilities:

Facilities include covered workshop spaces, an undercover outdoor cooking set-up, communal dining area, comfortable compost toilet, plenty of loo roll, and handwashing.  A good stone track leads to the parking area within the wood, this is suitable for cars, please keep speed under 10mph.

Tutor Bios

Deborah Schneebeli Morrell @plotandponder

Having originally trained in fine art Deborah became addicted to spoon carving ( she’s a spoon a day type!) after a long career as an artist/teacher and a writer of craft books.

She is known for investigating and carving a large variety of different wood species and has even realised that a lovely piece of wood can do more than anything to cheer you up! She has a lifelong interest in the value and meaning of making; at Spoonfest 2019 she co-curated the 'Spoons are good for you' exhibition which explored the therapeutic and transformational aspects of spoon carving.

Deborah is also the founder of the Highgate Spoon Union.

Jan Harm ter Brugge @spooncarver

With a background in product design, Jan Harm is a spooncarver, designer and teacher from the Netherlands.

Internationally renowned, Jan Harm teaches throughout Europe and is especially well known for his small sidebranch ‘shcoops’ and systematic way of handcarving mugs, which, he feels, should be a comfortable and natural extension of the hand.