Photo by Paul Craig when taking photos for a forthcoming review of Edmondson Interiors with EKBB business magazine
60 years old today!
Just great I can ramble and not care!
Some thoughts, some thanks and some forward plans.
What a stunning time of year in this beautiful part of the world we live in. The occasional warm day following a cold start, even an overnight flurry of snow visible in some places this morning.
Suddenly the days are longer again. The winter is a great time for planning but gardening and building things are best started in the Spring.
Getting to 60 is a spur. 20 years of the business being here in Goudhurst has flashed by. I must steel myself to make sure the next twenty are better planned. There is no time to waste. I have a debt to pay and a gift to give.
I am a remarkably fortunate chap. The people I work with at Edmondson Interiors are just great. Lovely, decent, committed humorous and chilled people. I put it down to wood. Making, building, creating. It is all very tangible, very earthy real and satisfying. I have taken up carving wooden spoons this year. Nothing I am very proud of yet but it is another challenge. Take up an axe, a couple of knives and a branch and follow the shape of the grain to see where it leads.
Lots happening at work. Beautiful new furniture designs now in the showroom. Timber store completed with massively over engineered racks and a forklift of wondrous beauty.
Machinery re-positioned, new machinery on order. Apprentices including my son Gus really getting their heads around what they are doing and forging ahead on their individual fronts.
Lots of other plans and ideas to develop all of which is gradually putting Edmondson Interiors into a gradually stronger position.
Family pressures. Remarkable. I get asked to play French cricket, never get to bat, have to fight for the occasional ball that lands at my feet and yet thoroughly enjoy the madness.
‘Dad, can you make me a bathroom cabinet?’ ‘Dad, can you give me a lift to the cinema, but wait outside?’ ‘Shall we play monopoly?’ Four boys and a daughter and both bins are full. Luv em!
This is the year of the garden shed. One wall in old French bricks with lime mortar. One wall clad in chopped selected firewood. Two walls in sawn green oak weatherboard with recycled matt black Crittall metal doors. Pool table inside, wood burning stove outside. I can’t wait to get started.
So this kind of says how happy I am and all this without a mention of my wife, Moyna who keeps everything and everyone sensible and grounded and happy.
Thankyou for so many remarkable people who influence my life. Thanks to the friends who have sent pictures of signs saying ‘Friendship Centre’ and pics of ‘Old people crossing the road’ signs!
