Vicki Hease - A Brief History

At the age of 11 Vicki knew she wanted to be a florist and upon leaving school at 16 went to college fulltime to study floristry at Tottenham Technical college in north London. Employed by Haringey council as their florist for 2 years, then head hunted to work at her old Saturday job florists, then to be manageress in their other branch in North London.

For 8 years Vicki then owned with her partner, later to be husband 2 florists in North London, then followed a period of freelance work and helping out florist colleagues. Houseplant supervisor and florist at a family owned Garden Centre in Colchester Essex before teaching floristry at Writtle College in Essex for 5 years prior to moving to the Highlands of Scotland to live near to her father in 2000.

Vicki only took up woodturning at the end of 2001 following the death of her father who turned most days Monday through Saturday until June 2001 when his illness prevented him doing so. He had suggested she have some lessons from Alec Mutch at Lael rather than learning from him as he did not want to teach her his bad habits. The bad habits where woodturning was concerned was that he was a perfectionist and he always had his pipe in his mouth, so no respirator mask was worn.

The initial lesson was in November 2001 with Vicki doing some practicing on the lathe in her Dad’s workshop. More lessons followed in April and May 2002 with more practice at her lathe and she soon became hooked.

A work shop was built onto her existing garage to house all the equipment and wood, (Dad collected wood as if it was going out of fashion) with the lathe being installed on 17 January 2003. Action stations on 18 January and vases, candlesticks, bowls and other items being turned from then on. Some of these were for gifts for the family others for sale or special commissions.

Since that inaugural turning day in her own workshop she has produced many vases in a variety of shapes and forms, bowls, candlesticks, door knobs, perfume boxes, trinket boxes, candlesticks, beads, mushrooms, honey drizzlers and many other items.

Now, the combination of the woodturned vases and arrangements made with fabric flowers, dried and preserved materials provide unique gifts for shoppers at local craft fairs and farmers markets and also at shows that Vicki attends during the course of the year. These include The Black Isle show in Muir of Ord, Moy show, 3D2D Inverness, Brodie Castle, St. Boniface Fair in Fortrose, and in October 2005 at the NAFAS exhibition in Bournemouth.

Click here to see an example of one of the designs showing some of the stages during the turning of the design.