Category: Personal Reflections
-
A Lineage Forged in Picardy In the late 1980s, my journey as a carver was anchored in the soil of the Somme and the historic regions of Picardy. To work on Amiens Cathedral is to be humbled; it is the largest Gothic structure in France, a vessel of “lacy stone” where I spent my days…
-
When one walks through the hushed corridors of the Ashmolean Museum, the eye is naturally drawn to the masterpieces on canvas. Yet, for a carver, the true revelation often lies at the periphery. There is a particular frame within those walls—carved by the incomparable Grinling Gibbons—that serves as a silent testament to a level of…
-
In my teachings and during our retreats, I often speak of the “architecture of the self.” This is not a metaphor I chose lightly. It is a philosophy I learned with my own hands while working on the great monuments of the English Renaissance—buildings designed by the masters Inigo Jones and Sir Christopher Wren. The…
-
As a child in the aftermath of the Second World War, my world was defined by the jagged geometry of the City’s bomb sites. To most, these were merely ruins; to me, they were my first playgrounds. I climbed through the exposed foundations and scorched timbers of a London that had stood since the Great…
-
There is a particular kind of stillness that settles over a historic building site before the public arrives—a brief window where the dust of the masons and the precision of the architecture exist in perfect, silent alignment. Looking back on the year 2000, while working as Head of Masonry and Conservation with St Blaise Ltd…
-
The Workman’s Brew: Covent Garden and the Inigo Jones Standard. The Formative Years Before my work became international, and before I reached the level of Master, I was cutting my teeth on the historic streets of London. The early 80s were my classroom, and the Grade I listed landmarks of the city were my teachers.…
-
I was looking through a drawer at home recently and found a piece of my history: a vintage Bahrain Hilton polo shirt from the 1990s. For many in Bahrain today, the “Hilton” name is synonymous with the sleek, 45-story tower that now dominates the Juffair skyline. But for me, this shirt is a portal back…