My Days with George Michael: Stone, Studios, and Star Power

I’m two years younger than George Michael. Before the fame, we were just nodding acquaintances around North London. Later on, we’d see each other at Le Beat Route in Soho and say hello—two local blokes out on the town. It was a small world back then. You’d see Boy George, Steve Strange, or the Spandau Ballet lot around the same clubs. We were just a generation of local kids trying to be the best at what we did.

The last time George and I really spoke, I was at Star Street Studio in Paddington. I was on my tools, laying the new stone front steps, and he was inside recording.

He recognized me immediately, and he actually came over to thank me for something that had happened a bit earlier. His mum, Lesley, had turned up at the studio on her bike—which was how everyone remembered her, just getting about on two wheels or three. I’d seen her arrive and carried the bike around the side of the building for her to keep it out of the way.

George didn’t forget that. We spent some time talking about the old characters we both knew from the pubs and clubs and how we were both getting on. We were both pretty irreverent about each other’s work—that was just the way of the time. I’d give him stick about the music, and he’d give me stick about the stone. But underneath the banter, there was a bit of local pride that we were both doing alright for ourselves.

I remember one time I was down on the ground working and he had to step over my shoulder to get into the studio. I looked up and told him, “I’m going to tell people I’ve had George Michael’s testicles inches from my face.”

Because of that shared history—and because I’d looked after his mum’s bike—he knew exactly how I meant it. He thought it was a great line and he absolutely roared. He didn’t take himself seriously at all; he was just a down-to-earth bloke who remembered where he came from.

The studio is gone now, but the work remains. I’m still carving, and I still remember the day I laid the steps for a mate who just happened to become a legend.

In September 2018, I had the pleasure of collaborating with Sam Fogg for their landmark ‘Stone Heads’ exhibition.

The Master’s Lineage: A Journey Through Stone, Wood, and Time

The Grit Behind the Lineage: Lessons from Syria

The Legacy of the Master Builder: From Knightsbridge to the Côte d’Azur

The Permanent Record: One Patron, Seven Hundred Miles of Stone

Structural Legacy: From the British Museum Great Court to the 1080 Protocol

The Gold Thread: A Discovery in a Drawer

The Itinerant Path: From Picardy’s Spires to the Soul of Stone

A Year in the Shadow of Greatness: My Tenure at Woburn Abbey

The Alchemical Stone: Lessons from a Practitioner of the Renaissance

The Start of My Philosophical JourneyThe Music of the Spheres: A Journey Through London’s Stone

The Master’s Ledger: Blood, Stone, and the Xhosa Training