Welcome to Winstanley & Co. Carpentry and Joinery.
My story into carpentry started like many other tradespeople. We were children who liked to use our hands and, like many, my story started with Lego, but also various other experiments in taking things apart and seeing how they worked. The biggest influence on my early years of ‘real world’ building was my grandad, who visited Bournemouth every month with my grandma (and a boot full of tools and toolboxes) from our family home town of Bristol. Each month, regardless of how up together our home was, grandad always seemed to find something ‘broken’ or something that needed upgrading… who knows, perhaps he just broke things to give himself a project and a new thing to fix and teach me a new skill.
As I grew up it was my love of music that took over and led to me studying music and working in venues and on tours. I was still using my hands, but in a different way. However, the first crossroads came when, through a chance meeting with a childhood schoolfriend, I was soon flying off to Peru. I lived in Pisco, Peru for a year working in an earthquake relief zone with children, but, predominantly building panel houses for the vibrant, proud, but often poverty stricken people of Pisco.
When I returned to the UK I was job hunting, looking for work with either my hands or with children due to my most recent CV experiences. The dice rolled and I began a career in Children’s Social Care working with adopted and fostered children and teenagers. After many fulfilling years children’s services were depleted and I was still aching to work with my hands. I was also now a homeowner who had completed many projects on my home. Having got to know the local trade stores well, I decided it was time to study carpentry at evening classes and then set up my business.
Winstanley & Co. was born with one of my main mindsets being to provide the type of service that my mum would like as a customer. I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about why my business should exist and what would make it successful. This basically led me to consider what things my mum told me she has liked and disliked when she was a customer using tradespeople as we grew up. I hope that all my customers feel satisfied with the carpentry, joinery and other services I provide them with, but, very importantly, I hope they feel that every step of the way having me work on their home is a positive and easygoing experience.
The other question I get asked is: why Winstanley & Co? Well, The Winstanleys was the name of a band I was in and the bass player designed us a logo I liked. The band didn’t last, but the name lives on in my company. My best mate tells me off because there currently is no ‘& Co’, it’s just me. In the long term I’d love a little van dog called Winstanley and then I’ll be the employee, the ‘& Co.’
Well, I’m sure if you’ve read to the end you’ll feel scared off by this waffle / my story, or, perhaps you’ll feel my personality fits you well and you’d like to contact me about your project. I hope it’s the latter.