Ludlow Stonecarving Festival.

23 May, 2011 – 12:49 pm

Well another exhilerating weekend has come and gone!!

Stonemasons descended on this beautiful example of a Medieval town to carve an unknown stone in order to help raise money for St Laurences Church in Ludlow.

We were given the choice of two sizes of local sandstone from a quarry near Shrewsbury-it was incredibly abrasive and quite crumbly, but so many beautiful carvings were created.

Saturday morning we all made a good start at 8am, stone was flying as we all knew that we had less than 2 days to show off our skills and create something worthy of selling in the auction!

I was unsure as to what I was going to carve as I had designed something for the alternative size stone, so I took my inspiration from what I had seen and experienced in the journey up, stopping at Kilpeck Church and Hereford Cathedral then having the chance to see some of the magnificent carvings on the local buildings!

So many interested members of the public eager to find out how we trained, where we worked and what we were carving, the sound of our fellow craftsmen chipping away and the traditional sound of Mediaval music spurred us on, but the day flew by and before we knew it the day was over and we were enjoying a lovely evening with good food, good company-and obviously good local beer from The Ludlow Brewery!!

Sunday morning is always hard as we know that we have to finish by 3pm, I had an early night and made a good start at 8am! We had lots more visitors as the doors opened to the public including the Mayor and local dignitries-all looking forward to seeing how we were progressing!

I am happy to say that we all finished in time and the standard was so high!

There were lots of interesting side stalls including a Blacksmith demonstration, traditional craft skills, childrens activities and historic talks and walks!

From the sale of the carvings approximately £4300 was raised to help restore part of this beautiful Church!

See you at the next one!

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  1. 4 Responses to “Ludlow Stonecarving Festival.”

  2. Great Write up 😀
    And the Dinner Sat night was really nice sit down affair inside St Laurences, what a great setting it was!

    By Rhidian on May 23, 2011

  3. It was great fun, looking forward to the next carving event!!

    By Carrie Horwood on May 23, 2011

  4. great idea to raise money, thanks for sharing images, the stone looks very soft and sandy. I just wish all the carvers wear dust masks

    By Robin Antar on May 23, 2011

  5. Hi Robin, a few of us were wearing masks, but it is up to the stonemasons at the end of the day! most of the stone was very green so the dust was not flying as it was so sticky!!!
    These events are very good for raising money, but obviously they are incredibly tiring!!!

    By Carrie Horwood on May 23, 2011

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