Craftland: A Journey Through Britains Lost Arts and Vanishing Trades

(Hardback)

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A dazzling, soul-stirring journey through the lost and endangered crafts that shaped Britain from multi-award-winning historian and broadcaster James Fox The story of craft is the story of who we are. Britain has always been a craft land. For generations what we made with our hands defined our families, communities and regions. Craftland brings to life the vanishing skills, traditions and trades that shaped the fabric and governed the rhythms of everyday life in Britain for hundreds of years. Through the stories of often humble-seeming objects of exquisite beauty, precision, utility and meaning, it shows how craft connects us to the land, emerging from local natural materials, and is the material expression of our regional identities and cultures. And through encounters with some of the last remaining master craftspeople at work today - weavers and wheelwrights, coopers and coppice-workers, boat-builders and bell-founders, silversmiths and watch-makers - we glimpse not only our past but another way of life, one that is not yet lost and whose wisdom could yet shape our future. For as long as there are humans, there will be craft, ever evolving in response to changing technologies, environments and communities. Craftland is a celebration of that deeply necessary connection between our creative instincts and the material world we inhabit, revealing a richer and more connected way of living.

Author Bio

James Fox is Director of Studies in History of Art at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, and a BAFTA-nominated broadcaster. He is the author of The World According to Colour- A Cultural History, which was chosen as a Book of the Year by the Sunday Times, Daily Telegraph, New Statesman and Spectator. His many acclaimed BBC television documentaries include programmes about British art, Japanese culture, the connections between art and nature, and the history of colour. He is also an advisor to the Loewe Craft Foundation and a Trustee of the Marchmont Makers Foundation, which supports arts and crafts practitioners across the Scottish Borders and beyond, aiming to inspire creativity across the arts, crafts, business and social enterprise.