Critically endangered crafts

that we cannot afford to lose?

A very interesting website popped up in my in box yesterday, "Cat, have you seen this?"

I think I did once see it in passing but I had not stopped to look. Yesterday I did and it alarmed me.  

It was a list compiled by the Heritage Crafts Association in the UK. They have apparently been making this list since 2017 and it consists of information about "extinct", "critically endangered" and "endangered" crafts. There is another list that says "currently viable" but it is obvious they are concerned about such things.

The lists apply to the UK and some of the crafts on there are very definitely UK crafts - such as Highlands and Islands thatching, Fair Isle strawback chair making, and Devon stave basket making. 

The reason the list was sent to me however was because "Shetland Lace knitting" was also on the list.  That startled me for a moment and then I realised the list was about those who work in these areas for their living. And yes, it alarmed me that there is probably just one person left who makes those extraordinary lace shawls from "cobweb" yarn - yarn so fine that it looks like sewing thread and a full size shawl really can be pulled through a wedding ring. 

I have knitted - even designed - Shetland shawls but I have never attempted anything that fine. I never will. It is far beyond my manual dexterity capacities. I have studied the construction of these things and I have researched the history of them. There are other enthusiasts with whom I communicate on a fairly regular basis. All of us are also concerned about keeping the art alive and the art of other things such as gansey making, Fair Isle knitting, Aran knitting and so on alive. 

There are plenty of groups on the internet for people who are simply interested in such things. For those of us who are very serious about such things the internet is one way of communicating with each other.

But more is needed than that. I looked at the things I am particularly interested in of course but there are other things that matter to everyone - things like "scientific glass working" (the making of specific glass materials for laboratories and other places) and "surgical instrument making". (No, all those precision instruments used by surgeons are not made entirely by machine, some are not made that way at all.)

My maternal grandfather was a "precision engineer". He made things to measurements so fine they could not be seen with the naked eye. It is the only thing for which I ever admired him.Years after his death we were still getting telephone calls (having kept their number) as to whether he could repair something or make something. He made one off instruments for surgeons and a small machine which is still in use at one of the hospitals - replacing it would now cost far more than the hospital can afford. People with his skills were in short supply even in the 1970's and 80's - twenty years after his death. There is no professional person in this city now who can do what he did. It did not pay well then, now it would be impossible to make a living that way. People would simply not be prepared to pay. 

And that is the problem of course. There are skills involved and the end results are more than simply "romantic shawls" or "comfy chairs that keep the drafts off your back" they are glass containers for research projects and instruments for a heart surgeon and much more. 

There are simply limits to what machines can do and what we can program computers to tell machines to do. Making things with our hands is something we all need to do. We also need to pay people to do these things. I am not wasting my time when I teach a child to knit - that child may end up learning to make the instrument that saves my life.