‘Nancy Holt - Sun Tunnels’ installation from a trip to the Goodwood Foundation in August

After a solid few months of back to back commissions, including alcove units, multiple desks, room dividers and hallway storage, I’m now in the final stages before heading to my first residency at High Desert Test Sites in Joshua Tree.

Over the past few months I’ve been looking back at the work of Richard Long, Nancy Holt, Robert Smithson and others from an era of Land Art and Earthworks, particularly those projects made across the deserts and landscapes of the American West.

Some might ask how any of this relates to my workshop based work.

Well, this year I’ve been thinking a lot about what it means to be a maker, and the use of the word ‘practice’ has kept coming up. What does it mean to have a practice, rather than simply making things?

How can I balance commissioned work, which centres around functionality, both in my mind and ultimately for the person using it in their home, with allowing time to develop standalone objects and ideas that embody the same principles without needing to be designed specifically for one particular space?

And how can I move the ideas and work that sit behind the physical workshop space I’ve created over the past seven plus years beyond the workshop itself? Beyond specific tools for a specific job, or the way I have trained myself to approach a commission.

The workshop has developed to a point where I can design and build projects that sustain me, which is something I’m incredibly grateful for. But I’m increasingly interested in what happens beyond that. What other forms can the practice take?

Walking in the Surrey Hills in Winter 2026

Is walking and taking photographs part of it? Is looking, collecting, documenting and exploring a form of making in itself? My research into Richard Long has certainly made me think about it more. In Walking the Line, Long describes the appeal of the simple rhythm of being outdoors:

“Now, he likes the ease and naturalness with which things come one after the other: walking, climbing, camping, gathering wood, lighting the fire, boiling water, packing up and walking again. Walking, he said to me, with its hardships and its pleasures, the surprise of discovery and growing experience, relaxation and concentration: walking is a good way to think. Steady rhythms.”

There’s something about that sequence that has stayed with me. The simplicity of one thing leading naturally to the next. Walking, climbing, camping, gathering wood, making a fire, cooking, packing up and moving on.

It also connects with some of the ideas I’ve been reading around the American homesteading and ‘back to the land’ movements that began to emerge in the post war period and grew through the 1960s and 70s. A desire to step away from an increasingly industrialised and consumer driven way of life, to live more simply, make things for yourself and become more connected to the land.

A project for Jack & Meg in their new home. Open shelving for books, closed storage below, and a raised shelf for the TV with space for the soundbar underneath.

I’d previously worked with Jack & Meg on a larger piece for their previous home. That unit was passed on to the new owners when they moved, but they wanted to create something with a similar approach for their new space.

The large yellow project I shared last month was for the new owners Madeline & Patrick.

A project for Joe & Freddie, the new owners of a flat I had previously worked in, creating a large Douglas Fir Hallway Shelving Unit in 2022.

For this space, they wanted something that could work as a practical workspace during the day, while doubling up as a spot for DJing in the evenings.

Set up with a pair of CDJs and raw finished Genelec monitors, it’s ready to go. Good luck to the neighbours!