L’ETACQ WOODCRAFTS
BY THE “JERSEY LIFE’ REPORTER
In the remote westerly village of L’Etacq, where the farmers gather huge piles of vraic at low tide, and legend has it that a manor and an oak forest lie beneath the sea, a Jersey woodcarver, almost in spite of himself it seems, has created a tremendous tourist attraction. A large car park is now reserved for L‘Etacq Woodcrafts, and coaches and charabancs disgorge visitors who throng the little showroom and surge through blue stable doors up a wide stone staircase to explore the workshops in a loft above.
Following the crowd, I saw the broad figure of Mr. Phillip Le Gresley straighten up from his bench, where two delicately carved chess knights in the making were absorbing his attention. Glancing at his swollen cheek, I remarked sympathetically ‘Why, you’ve got toothache! Is it very painful?’
‘No, no’, he chuckled, ‘I expect plenty of people think that. You see I chew tobacco. I like a pipe but the smoke gets in my eyes while I’m at the bench’. The plug remained in his cheek, unseen and immobile for the next hour, and in no way affected his speech.
The son and grandson of Jersey woodworkers, Mr. Le Gresley struck me as a rather remarkable man. Good business man though he must be, the impression he gives is of a serene and simple person, with a great devotion to his craft.
‘I started wood-carving as a little boy‘ he told me, ‘and I’ve been at it ever since. I hardly know how all this came to pass. It was the visitors who pushed me into it. They used to post their letters by the window of my little workshop down the road, and they were always on at me to open a shop and sell my carvings’.
In those days Mr. Le Gresley ran his own joinery and carpentry business from his farmhouse home nearby. In 1952 he built his present house, looking out over I’Etacquerel Rock, converting the loft into workshops and a wood store. Six years ago he added a little shop-cum-showroom below, stone steps to lead from outside to the loft, and opened L’Etacq Woodcrafts.
Burmese teak, mahogany, American walnut, sycamore, beech, oak, lime and Lignum Vitae, one of the hardest woods in the world, are the principal media for his work. He dropped a piece of the Lignum into a bucket of water and it sank like a stone. There was much to admire, but the rustic tables edged in natural bark attracted me particularly. So did the carved lampshades, the little hall chairs of old oak and mahogany and the salad and fruit bowls, oiled to a rich deep brown. Huge wooden spoons hung over some of the work benches, inscribed ‘Please ensure that brain is engaged before operating mouth’. ‘Those are quite popular’, Mr. Le Gresley told me, ‘we make them to sell to the pubs for hanging in the bar’.
Mr. Le Gresley and his two young assistants (‘it‘s a nine-year apprenticeship, then they’ll probably start up for themselves somewhere’), work away placidly at their benches while the interested visitors wander around, breathe down their necks and ask innumerable questions, all of which are answered with courtesy and patience. ‘All the same, we have to catch up on the stock by working in the evenings’.
One end of the loft leads to the woodstore where huge lime logs cut in Grouville lie waiting to be turned into tables; fishing nets hang from the beams and seascapes by Jersey painters adorn the walls and sometimes sell to the visitors. He lends this wall space to an artist friend whose picturesque presence and conversation is very much in keeping with the atmosphere.
BY THE “JERSEY LIFE’ REPORTER
In the remote westerly village of L’Etacq, where the farmers gather huge piles of vraic at low tide, and legend has it that a manor and an oak forest lie beneath the sea, a Jersey woodcarver, almost in spite of himself it seems, has created a tremendous tourist attraction. A large car park is now reserved for L‘Etacq Woodcrafts, and coaches and charabancs disgorge visitors who throng the little showroom and surge through blue stable doors up a wide stone staircase to explore the workshops in a loft above.
Following the crowd, I saw the broad figure of Mr. Phillip Le Gresley straighten up from his bench, where two delicately carved chess knights in the making were absorbing his attention. Glancing at his swollen cheek, I remarked sympathetically ‘Why, you’ve got toothache! Is it very painful?’
‘No, no’, he chuckled, ‘I expect plenty of people think that. You see I chew tobacco. I like a pipe but the smoke gets in my eyes while I’m at the bench’. The plug remained in his cheek, unseen and immobile for the next hour, and in no way affected his speech.
The son and grandson of Jersey woodworkers, Mr. Le Gresley struck me as a rather remarkable man. Good business man though he must be, the impression he gives is of a serene and simple person, with a great devotion to his craft.
‘I started wood-carving as a little boy‘ he told me, ‘and I’ve been at it ever since. I hardly know how all this came to pass. It was the visitors who pushed me into it. They used to post their letters by the window of my little workshop down the road, and they were always on at me to open a shop and sell my carvings’.
In those days Mr. Le Gresley ran his own joinery and carpentry business from his farmhouse home nearby. In 1952 he built his present house, looking out over I’Etacquerel Rock, converting the loft into workshops and a wood store. Six years ago he added a little shop-cum-showroom below, stone steps to lead from outside to the loft, and opened L’Etacq Woodcrafts.
Burmese teak, mahogany, American walnut, sycamore, beech, oak, lime and Lignum Vitae, one of the hardest woods in the world, are the principal media for his work. He dropped a piece of the Lignum into a bucket of water and it sank like a stone. There was much to admire, but the rustic tables edged in natural bark attracted me particularly. So did the carved lampshades, the little hall chairs of old oak and mahogany and the salad and fruit bowls, oiled to a rich deep brown. Huge wooden spoons hung over some of the work benches, inscribed ‘Please ensure that brain is engaged before operating mouth’. ‘Those are quite popular’, Mr. Le Gresley told me, ‘we make them to sell to the pubs for hanging in the bar’.
Mr. Le Gresley and his two young assistants (‘it‘s a nine-year apprenticeship, then they’ll probably start up for themselves somewhere’), work away placidly at their benches while the interested visitors wander around, breathe down their necks and ask innumerable questions, all of which are answered with courtesy and patience. ‘All the same, we have to catch up on the stock by working in the evenings’.
One end of the loft leads to the woodstore where huge lime logs cut in Grouville lie waiting to be turned into tables; fishing nets hang from the beams and seascapes by Jersey painters adorn the walls and sometimes sell to the visitors. He lends this wall space to an artist friend whose picturesque presence and conversation is very much in keeping with the atmosphere.
One of Mr. Le Gresley’s proudest achievements is a magnificent seigneurial chair in English oak ordered by the Parish of St. Ouen for presentation to the people of Sark. This led to an order for a similar chair from a lady resident of that island, in memory of her father, the late Mr. R. M. Lamb.
The extremely busy shop below, where the smaller wood-carvings are sold, is run by the son-in-law, Mr. Gordon Richard and the owner is not very often seen there. ‘I‘m happier up above carving’
he remarked, obviously longing to return to his Lignum Vitae chessmen, so I said good-bye.
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