Nick Malyon was seduced by neon lighting at the end of the 1980s while travelling in America. He left home after failing his A-levels and doing a disastrous four-year stint as a vintage car salesman in London. "I was introduced to a sign painter and a neon signmaker, and it seemed like an alternative lifestyle to the one I'd left behind. On my return to the UK, I was probably attempting to carry on some American dream by training, but I loved the weird alchemy of illuminating a piece of bent glass tubing - the change from nothing to something."
Malyon's art is on display this month during London Craft Week (LCW). His work will represent one of the many endangered crafts on show this year. "Over the centuries, crafts have ebbed and flowed; some die out but others grow to replace them," said Daniel Carpenter, executive director of Heritage Crafts, the charity that produces the annual red list of endangered skills. "But what we're seeing now is something different - it's like an extinction-level event."
Heritage Crafts' red list includes gloomy news. Cricket ball manufacture is extinct in the UK, while cricket bats are on the endangered list alongside kilt and bagpipe making. Construction of currach boats and the sporran are also on the critical list.
Carpenter said competition from low-wage economies overseas is a key factor. "And just the ease of being able to buy things from anywhere in the world - with no awareness of who's made it or what conditions they work in. Just with a click of a mouse."
Denne historien er fra May 10, 2024-utgaven av The Guardian Weekly.
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Denne historien er fra May 10, 2024-utgaven av The Guardian Weekly.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Starlink's conquest of the Amazon leaves Brazil in a dilemma
The helicopter swooped into one of the most inaccessible corners of the Amazon rainforest. Brazilian special forces commandos leaped from it into the caiman-inhabited waters below.
Dalai Lama's mountain town feels the strain of tourist boom
SUVs and saloon cars pass slowly along McLeod Ganj's narrow one-way Jogiwara Road, blaring horns at pedestrians and scooter riders and playing loud music.
'I am all the world' The brutal rule of a West Bank settler
Palestinians tell ofblacklisted Yakov's reign across the Jabal Salman valley and heisjust one of many violent bosses
Stormy waters New flashpoint emerges in South China Sea dispute
Hopes that tensions in the South China Sea might ease have been short lived.
'Justice delayed' Why trust in public inquiries to bring closure is fading
After the final report of the Grenfell fire inquiry was published, Hisam Choucair, who lost six family members in the blaze, said: \"We did not ask for this inquiry... It's delayed the justice my family deserves.\"
Celeriac soup with almond pangrattato
I'm not ashamed to say that as soon as September hits, my stick blender comes out. Just as I embrace salads when the clocks go forward in the UK, I wholeheartedly throw myself into soup season once the summer holidays end. Autumn is approaching in the northern hemisphere and I'm ready with my ladle. Celeriac is one of my favourite soup heroes, because it gives the creamiest, silkiest finish with little effort. You don't have to make the almond pangrattato, but it is a wonderful addition.
Are smoke signals telling me to make an oil change in the kitchen?
Should you that is, not can you) cook with extra-virgin olive oil? Antonio, Atlanta, Georgia, US
Going underground
A darkly humorous encounter between an American spy-cop and the members ofan eco-commune she is hired to infiltrate
All work and no play
Hard Graft, a powerfulnew London exhibition, focuses onworkers’ exploitation, from the ruined hands ofa washerwoman to mothers forced to sell their bodies
What the princess and the shaman tell us about hereditary privilege
It should have been an Instagram-perfect wedding image, but it turned out to be something more embarrassing.
