A family run Powys blacksmith has revealed its latest spectacular creations - two spectacular pieces of metalwork for a customer in Switzerland.
Artmetals, run by the Barrett family in Rhayader, have been creating bespoke designs for over 40 years over two generations and recently had their first ever commission from overseas.
The latest creation has seen the company create a metal staircase in the form of a tree they named Groot, and an Alps-themed Firesphere.
“It started off going to be a handrail in an organic style and it just sort of snowballed,” said Adam Barrett.
“It was a couple of months of work. We had been talking to the client about tit since mid-summer. We were only on site for a couple days.”
“It is unusual but it’s the sort of thing we do. We do bespoke metalwork, so we do anything really. We have done similar things for Thame Park in Oxfordshire. We did a similar tree design and that was the basis we used to sell it to the guy. We did a walkway with a series of about 10 of them.”
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The business was started over 40 years ago in Worcester by Adam’s father James and inspired Adam and his brother Tom to join the family business.
“My dad started off in agricultural equipment gates and cattle barriers and things like that,” said Adam. “He is a self-taught blacksmith and went into the more decorative stuff over time as he needed to diversify away from agricultural equipment.
“I grew up with and went to college in Hereford and did blacksmithing in Hereford my brother tom did the same at Moreton Morrell in Warwickshire.
“It’s me and my brother and my dad is still involved to a degree. He largely works form home, since Covid.
"He set his own little forge up there so we send him bits from time to time it is very much a family business.”
The business made the move to Rhayader two years ago from Bromsgrove and have been very happy since the move.
“My dad started off in a double garage in his mums place, and since then he had always rented a place and it became an ambition of ours to own a place of our own and that would give us the freedom to change the building round to suit us,” said Adam.
“Wales gave us that opportunity. Its been wonderful, its been great we’ve been really welcomed into the community here and we love it. We have done some nice work for people in the area and it still allows us to cover our old business in Worcestershire and we have a way bigger building which has allowed us to take on really big projects.”
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