It all began….

Back in 2012, when husband and wife team Steven and Kirsty Le Say hosted a Spoon Carving Workshop in a friends garden on the request of a few interested neighbours.

In the years since, we’ve opened up our own workshop within the Brecon Beacons National Park, where we host a number of courses, teaching primitive skills and bushcraft.  Steve teaches overseas as well, with Living by Nature and we are regularly exhibiting crafts or teaching at various events across Europe.

Our new space in beautiful South Wales overlooked the stunning Black  Mountain.  Our smallholding includes workshop space, 8 acres of land, a small woodland and a stream.  We also have a Shepherds Hut to host your for a longer stay if you wish.  It’s all nestled within the Brecon Beacons National Park in stunning scenery.  A hiking footpath onto the Beacons themselves, runs directly parallel to our land.

  • We teach bushcraft and ancestral skills for all ages and levels of experience

  • We hand craft items inspired by ancestral craft, often using primitive tools and techniques.  We also create bespoke pieces on request

  • We’re available to exhibit and teach at events.  We also curate fellow craftspeople for larger events under ‘The Craft Collective’

  • We write regularly for The Bushcraft Journal

MEET US

Steven Le Say

Co-Founder, craftsman and primitive skills and craft expert

Steven is a primitive skills and Bushcraft instructor and craftsman.  Steve and his wife Kirsty run Axe & Paddle Bushcraft, teaching a range of crafts such as Paddle Carving, Moccasin Making and Fur Tanning.  He is also an instructor with Living by Nature, teaching in various locations across Europe.

Primarily Steve enjoys making and recreating primitive artefacts – anything from primitive fishing hooks to sinew backed bows.  He also makes a range of high quality ‘old-style’ camping bags and tents and carves solid wood canoe paddles.  He can turn his hand to any craft, with a fine eye for detail.  His passion for primitive skills and Bushcraft was born as a child, when his mother showed him a book about Native American Crafts, and he subsequently embarked upon a lifetime of learning each of the skills he read about and making replicas of the crafts he saw.

“I hope to encourage others to learn and enhance their primitive knowledge and skills, practice techniques and push themselves.”

Kirsty Le Say

Co-Founder

Kirsty has led a more corporate career path, but studied in a creative field. This has given her the business brain to get Axe & Paddle Bushcraft from a hobby to where it is now, as well as the artistic eye to help design the products, present the brand and envisage the next 3 years and beyond. Kirsty designs, makes, looks after social media and website, bookings and communications and keeps Steve in check too, which is no mean feat!