‘The third largest craft in the country’
donkey belonging to a friend of mine in Dingle but that’s about all I do.”
Traditionally, a meeting point where news was shared, nowadays the forge is a quieter workplace, although Florrie is still kept company by people dropping in.
“You’d hardly see anyone now. Rural Ireland is gone. There isn’t a Christian around. They don’t open the pubs till later and we don’t have a shop anymore, and it used to be very vibrant.”
And when he closes, he knows there won’t be anyone to replace him.
“It bothers me. It really troubles me,” he says. “You know, the place will have to be sold — there’s nobody here to take it over.
“I do have regrets about it but we’ ll put them to bed.” IT could be argued that blacksmiths are a dying breed, but some working in the craft believe its future is looking brighter than it was even 25 years ago.
The Irish Artist Blacksmiths Association (IABA) has over 40 members but a survey conducted in the past number of years suggests there are between 150 and 200 blacksmiths in Ireland.
Nowadays, most Irish blacksmiths have to study abroad to hone their craft — most travelling to one of three colleges in the UK offering courses, with most choosing Herefordshire & Ludlow College in the West Midlands, near the Welsh border.
Michael Budd, who operates his forge in Castlebaldwin, Co Sligo, was on the board of directors of the National School of Blacksmithing in Belmullet, Co Mayo, founded in 1999 by filmmaker David Shaw-Smith, who made the
series for RTÉ. The school folded about five years later after the Design & Crafts Council of Ireland pulled funding. The survey was commissioned in the hope of reopening it.
“I can never understand why smithing doesn’t get more support. It’s the third-largest craft in Ireland and worth about €15m to the economy,” Mr Budd told the
“People are still captivated by blacksmithing and it’s a booming industry around the world right now. We have so much ironwork to be restored in Ireland, besides the contemporary side of it, and yet there is no recognition for it, while resources are being put into blacksmithing in the UK, Germany and America.”
Colm Bagnall, vice-chairman of the IABA and co-owner of Bushy Park Ironworks in Tallaght, Dublin, says the future’s looking brighter for blacksmithing now than it was 25 years ago when he started.
“It’s much healthier now. If I look for another smith to discuss a problem I’ve encountered, I can find young ones who are active, compared to years ago when there was nobody,” he said.
“During the boom, when we were looking for smiths, most of them came from Eastern Bloc countries.”