ONE TO WATCH
Artisan blacksmith Leszek Sikon`
Tell us a little about your background.
I am originally from Poland and I used to earn a decent wage as a manager in retail, yet over time this career left me feeling wholly unfulfilled. Knowing that I wanted to do something using my hands and create something that would last, I quit my job and enrolled on a blacksmithing course at Hereford College of Arts. Since I completed the course, I have focused my career on forging superb kitchen knives and other useful tools. Q Where do find inspiration? I look back in history to more traditional methods. I love the process of forging and how it can transform a lump of steel into a beautiful and useful object, I can lose hours doing it while I try to figure out how to make a pattern or forge a random piece of scrap metal into something new. Q Who has inspired you? I owe a lot to the teachers that introduced me to blacksmithing – Delyth Done, Ambrose Burne and Adrian Legge all motivated me to push boundaries. In addition, I also love the work of Mick Maxen and Mareko Maumasi and wish to reach their level of mastery and pattern-making skills.
Q Can you tell us about your technique?
I specialise in pattern welding, most commonly known as Damascus steel. To explain in more detail, I layer different alloys of steel to create unique patterns that I then use to forge my knife designs. Many of the tools that I use in the workshop have a long history, such as the coke forges from the 18th century and the Pilkington power hammer, which is almost 100 years old. A number of our other hand tools were acquired from other workshops that were closing down. If I keep using and maintaining the tools they should last for another century or two!
Q How has your work evolved over time?
Each time I make a knife I notice things that I could do differently, although I think that’s quite common for many craftspeople. Looking back through my work over the years,
I can clearly see an ever-evolving style; sometimes I change the handle, the material, the blade shape or even the heat treatment process. It’s all a learning process and I think after three years as a full-time blacksmith I have now begun to create the knives that I imagined when I set out on this journey.
Q Tell us a bit about your workshop.
I’m sharing my workspace with my friends from Kingdom Forge in Suffolk, and over the years we have managed to gather all the equipment we need, from ancient tools to modern welders and grinders. Having said that, we are always on the lookout for equipment – new or old.
Q What’s been your most exciting project so far?
For Shell Tools I created a set of farm tools and presented them for the Transition exhibition at Ypres 2016 (a major international touring exhibition for forged metal design). The aim of the exhibition was to create work in memory of the First World War. Using original shells from weapons used in the war, I created new tools with the aim to show the cyclical process of ‘tools of destruction’ into ‘tools of creation’. Also, when researching, I discovered a story about some church bells that were confiscated by the army and then smelted into weapons. I later found out that this was a common practice in order to gain any available steel for use in weapon production.
Q What’s in the pipeline for you this year?
I was recently awarded a grant from QEST and planned to go to Japan in the summer to study knife-making and learn about smelting tatara steel. Unfortunately, due to Covid-19, I have not been able to begin the course but I do hope to attend soon. Also, I really want to make a knife from scratch, so not only forge it from steel but actually smelt the steel that I will use.
“I LOVE THE PROCESS OF FORGING AND HOW IT CAN TRANSFORM A LUMP OF STEEL
INTO A BEAUTIFUL AND USEFUL OBJECT”