NIBuilder 32-1

FOCUS ON EXTERIORS

The beauty of stonework.

under my jeans and several vests. I even decided to grow a beard to keep my face warm this winter! I don’t stop for rain. I just nail a tarp to the wall and work under that. If you didn’t work when it rained, you’d never work at all! I love getting my hands dirty, and the physicality of the work. You clearly have a passion for your craft, why is that? It’s a lovely job. You know that what you have created will be there for a hundred years at least. Maybe my grandchildren will see it, and their grandchildren. It fills me full of pride. My great-uncle Johnny was a stonemason. He died when I was very young, but the houses he built are still standing and lived in. That sense of continuation and connection between past and future appeals to me, and I’m proud to carry on our family’s stonemason tradition. There’s also some kind of pull from stone - I don’t know what it is. My middle daughter, who is five, loves to collect stones. Maybe she’s got the stone bug too! How do you approach a new project? I never take a job on for the money, it’s more about the challenge to myself. I’m more interested if it’s a stone type I’ve not worked with before, or if it’s something I’ve not built previously. Once the project is agreed with the client, I’ll source the stone from quarries or g

“There aremany moremasons around nowand this has raised standards across the board.”

www.northernbuilder.co.uk

FOLLOW US ON:

NI BUILDER | 47

Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online