THE MAKERS' REVIVAL

Faced with the pressures of a harsh economic climate and other challenges of the modern world, traditional craft practices are declining in the UK, but there are promising glimmers of hope for even the most endangered crafts, says Jenny Oldaker

- Jenny Oldaker

We're living in a fast-paced society, where instant gratification is the norm and automation is valued. It's a challenging climate for traditional crafts, which require meticulous skills and intricate techniques, along with time, effort and expertise. Just this year, Royal Stafford pottery and watchmakers Loomes of Stamford are among the artisan businesses to have ceased trading - with Moorcroft narrowly avoiding a similar fate - all casualties of the tough conditions facing today's craftspeople. Rising operational costs, lack of structured training and fierce competition are among the factors causing such businesses to fold - not to mention the fact that many practitioners of these crafts are older, and finding new, younger trainees and entrants to a craft can be difficult. This seems a bleak scenario for the UK's craftspeople; it was very much how Daniel Carpenter felt when he co-founded Heritage Crafts back in 2009. Noting the precarious nature of many traditional crafts, the charity is designed to celebrate, support and safeguard these skills. It offers a spectrum of help that covers everything from raising awareness and advocacy to training bursaries, and promoting wider engagement with the industry. Research into the decline of heritage crafts is another facet of the charity's work, and in 2017 Heritage Crafts launched the Red List of Endangered Crafts, which uses a system of four categories of risk: extinct in the UK, critically endangered, endangered, and currently viable. In the project, these crafts are defined as 'a practice which employs manual dexterity and skill at the point of production, an understanding of traditional materials, design and techniques, and which has been practiced for two or more successive generations'.