An Interview from History

Dr Helen Wilson imagines a conversation with carver Violet Pinwill (1874-1957) to guest editor John Samworth, based on her research

Black and white photo of a pensive woman.
Violet Pinwill as a young woman (Pinwill Family)

In this issue of Woodcarving my guest is Dr Helen Wilson. Helen retired from academia to pursue her interests in local history, architecture and churches. She has extensively researched the life and work of a group of siblings, collectively known as the Pinwill sisters. Through Helen’s work we are able to glimpse the social history of these remarkable woodcarving folk between 1890s and 1950s. Here is an interview with one sister, Violet Pinwill (1874- 1957), ecclesiastical woodcarver. The conversation is based on the diligent research of Helen.

An ‘interview’ with Violet Pinwill

What is your family background?

I was born in 1874 in Moulton, Lincolnshire. My father, the Rev’d Edmund Pinwill, originated in Holbeton, Devon, but moved around the country with his various appointments, so my sisters and I were born in parishes across the country. In 1880, my father came home to Devon, taking the post of vicar of Ermington, only a few miles from Holbeton. He arrived there with my mother Elizabeth, a highly accomplished musician born in London, who took a great interest in the education of her seven daughters. I was only six years old when we arrived in Ermington and spent the rest of my life in Devon. The greater part of that time I devoted to a career as a professional ecclesiastical woodcarver, with a large workshop in Plymouth. The company has become one of the foremost in the West Country with work in more than 185 churches across Devon and Cornwall.

Tell us how you came to be a carver?

When the family arrived in Ermington, the church there was in a poor state and needed restoring. Work began in 1885, and a team of craftsmen arrived, among them a master woodcarver named William Giles. Ever conscious of our education, our mother wisely decided that her daughters would be the happier in having professions, and arranged for three of us to take lessons in woodcarving from Mr Giles.

Many women and girls in those days took up woodcarving as a hobby, and it was often taught in schools, but from the beginning the idea was that this training might enable us to pursue a career, if we so chose. The choice of this particular branch of art was to some extent influenced by the fact that our grandfather had been an amateur carver of some merit. By the end of the church restoration, my sisters Mary and Ethel and I were well grounded in the technical part of woodcarving, and then continued learning the other branches of this art, such as drawing, modelling and designing.

19th-century photo of two people in front of carvings.

The three of us decided we would indeed become professional woodcarvers and set up our own business in 1890, naming it Rashleigh, Pinwill & Co. We were supported and encouraged by our parents in this venture, made all the more possible by establishing a workshop in Plymouth and working alongside the architect Edmund H Sedding, who produced many high-quality designs for us to carve. At the time, we knew of no other women working as professional woodcarvers, although, as time went on, more women became attracted to the art as a career.

After my sister Mary left the company to get married in 1900 and then Ethel moved away to Surrey, I was left running the business on my own. With commissions increasing, I moved the company into larger premises and at the height of our success, in the period running up to the Great War, I employed about 30 carvers and joiners.

Marble nativity scene relief with figures and baby Jesus.
Alabaster panel depicting the Nativity, carved by Violet Pinwill and designed by Edmund H Sedding for the reredos installed in Ermington church in 1911 (Sue Andrew)
Ornate wooden church screen with intricate carved designs.
Lady Chapel Screen installed in 1917 at Poundstock, Cornwall, carved by Violet Pin will and designed by Edmund H Sedding and Basil Stallybrass (Helen Wilson)
Wooden angel sculpture in prayer position.
Angel support on the altar rail sat Plympton St Mary, Plymouth, placed on display at Harris & Sons in August 1910 (Helen Wilson) 
Vintage handcrafted wooden furniture collection.
Pieces of household furnishings made by Violet Pinwill, most of which were for members of her family (Pinwill Family)

Describe your work and design process

Larger ecclesiastical commissions are mostly designed by architects, who provide the plans. I then have to draw out the details of the carving myself, and I make sketches in my studio at the end of the workshop. For figures and other more three-dimensional work, models or maquettes are made in clay and approved by the architect before carving. These maquettes now form an extensive bank in the workshop, to be used again as required.

My firm has restored many roodscreens over the years, among them those at Manaton, Devon, and St Buryan, Cornwall. For these, the ancient carvings were reproduced, which required impressions in wax to be taken from the old work, and plaster casts made from which to work. A collection of such casts is, again, part of the paraphernalia required by an enterprising woodcarver. I have also collected pieces of old carving that are too frail to reuse but intact enough to save. These can also be used as models or for inspiration.

I also create my own designs, many of which are memorial bench ends, and the style and subject are usually based on the life of the person commemorated. This was so for some of my work at St Martin by Looe, Cornwall. I am fond of one for a young man who drowned in the Himalayas, for which his mother provided photographs for me to work from. At Sheepstor, Devon, in collaboration with the incumbent, I designed bench ends on the theme of the History of the Christian Church, one of which depicts ‘Calling of the First Crusade by Peter the Hermit’.

Ornate wooden church altar with statues and stained glass.
Reredos for Crantock, Cornwall, placed on exhibition at the art gallery of Harris & Sons, George Street, Plymouth, in May 1902 (Helen Wilson)
Historical room filled with intricate sculptures and plaster casts.
The Pinwill workshop in 1917at St Lawrence Yard, Plymouth, showing numerous maquettes (models) used as the basis for carvings, some many times over. On the left is the completed Lady Chapel Screen for Poundstock, Cornwall (Pinwill Family)
Intricate wooden carving featuring animals and mythical creatures.
Detail of the c.1530 screen at St Buryan, Cornwall, restored in 1910 by Rashleigh, Pinwill & Co (Roy Reed)

What are some of the influences and inspirations behind your carving style?

Most of our early work was designed by Edmund H Sedding, nephew of the Arts & Crafts architect John Dando Sedding. Edmund took the naturalistic approach of that movement to new levels, inspired by the countryside and coast of Devon and Cornwall. At Crantock, Cornwall, his designs for bench ends include seaweed and fishes, and a spider in her web. Later, when I was designing my own work at St Martin by Looe, Cornwall, I found myself equally inspired and based some of the bench ends on similar naturalistic themes.

Other architects who commissioned work from us were much more traditional and used only medieval forms and symbolism for their church furnishings. Frederick Bligh Bond was an authority on medieval rood screens and in 1904, when asked to create a new screen for Lydford, Devon, produced a highly traditional design. In the coving are several rows of running ornament, the widest one with birds pecking at bunches of grapes. This symbolises the human soul succoured by the blood of Christ and would have been understood by medieval parishioners.

Intricate medieval wood carving of knights and castle.
Bench end at Sheepstor, Devon, designed and carved by Violet Pinwill (HelenWilson) 
WWI memorial plaque with saints, St. George and St. Martin.
Memorial for the Great War at Lewannick, Cornwall, with low relief carving, coloured and gilded, carved by Rashleigh, Pinwill & Co (Helen Wilson) 
Ornate wooden carving with intricate details and memorial inscription.
Bench front carved in chestnut by Rashleigh, Pinwill & Co for the Lady Chapel at Liskeard, Cornwall, between 1927 and 1937 (Helen Wilson)
Cozy medieval church nave with ornate wooden pews.
Set of benches by Rashleigh, Pinwill & Co. installed by company joiners at Crantock, Cornwall, in 1906 (Clair Pawley)

What are your favourite types of wood and why?

Oak is the traditional wood for church furnishings. I rarely use English oak, as it has a tendency to crack. Instead, I use Baltic or American oak, which I can get brought by train from the docks. Since the end of the Great War, oak has become so expensive that I offer chestnut when churches are short of funds. For instance, all the furnishings in the Lady Chapel at Liskeard, Cornwall, were worked in chestnut, which closely resembles oak. It is not so tough and can be unequal, but when good it has much to recommend it. Occasionally, I work with limewood on smaller projects, such as picture frames for family and friends.

Did the two World Wars impact on your work?

Yes, enormously. During the Great War, many of my employees joined up, but there was also little demand from the churches for new work and the business shrank. After the war, most of my work was in making memorials to those who had died. Then the recession came and, again, business was slow, and churches had to raise money and commission work piecemeal. By the time of the second world war, tastes changed away from carved work and towards plain surfaces.

Tell us a bit about your employee

All kinds of carving and joinery work are carried out in the workshop, and I am assisted by highly skilled craft workers, numbers of which have been here for many years and trained under me. The work of the carvers is plain enough but the joinery side is perhaps less so. First, the rough wood has to be machined and measured out, and then planed and moulded before it is ready for carving. When the carving is complete, the larger pieces are assembled by the joiners to ensure they fit well together. The work is transported dismantled to the church, often by carrier and train, accompanied by joiners, who lodge locally until the work of installation is complete. For one commission at Crantock, Cornwall, 18 benches with carved ends took over three weeks to install, because each piece of wood needed to be shaped individually to fit.

As I mentioned, when I first started there were very few other women, if any, working as professional woodcarvers. That gradually changed and because many women were already skilled in the art, it was a matter of having the courage to make the change from amateur to professional. After the Great War, more women wanted to have careers and it was my privilege to be able to welcome women into my workforce, including Phyllis Hunt and Lillian Wells, who have been a great credit to the company.

What do you do when you’re not carving?

Carving has always fascinated me, and I am so keen on my work that I have practically no time for hobbies. I look after the executive side of the business as well as the practical, and I also teach woodcarving classes at Plymouth Art College. What little time I do have is spent visiting family and friends and making pieces of household furniture for them.

Intricate wooden ceiling carvings with bird and floral motifs.
Detail of the screencarvedby Rashleigh, Pinwill & Co. and designed by Frederick Bligh Bond in 1904 for Lydford, Devon (Helen Wilson)
Intricate wooden church pew carvings with floral designs.
Choir stall bench end at Crantock, Cornwall, carved by Rashleigh, Pinwill & Co. and designed by Edmund H. Sedding for the restoration 1899-1902 (Helen Wilson)
Elderly woman smiling with glasses and long grey hair.
Helen Wilson
Book: The Remarkable Pinwill Sisters by Helen Wilson

If you would like to find out more about Violet Pinwill and her sisters, visit the website www.pinwillsisters.org.uk where you will also find details of the book: The Remarkable Pinwill Sisters (2021) by Helen Wilson, 300 pages, 350+ illustrations, Second Impression £30.

Helen is available for presentations and can be contacted through the website.

Further reading

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