The second issue of Tools & Tales is out. This time, the focus is on the women in and around our field. To be honest, as Laura Sneeboer writes in her foreword: it was about time.
The cover features Wilma, Laura, and Noa, grandmother, mother, and daughter, all three connected to the blacksmith shop in Bovenkarspel, where we’ve been making garden tools since 1913.
Craftsmanship takes many forms
Sneeboer is made by people, and by no means just by the blacksmiths in the workshop. Lilian talks about her nearly thirty years with the company, from answering the phone to the online orders she now ships all over the world. During the 2020 lockdown, Elsa came up with the idea of delivering online orders by horse and cart. And Wilma Peelen was the familiar face of Sneeboer for many years, now known at Chelsea as the Queen of Chelsea. By the way, did you know that since May, for the first time in 113 years, there’s been a woman working in our workshop? Sophie combines her work with us with a three-year vocational training program.
Two hand trowels with a story
The flowerbed trowel was already featured in the 1899 catalog of the English company Suttons. After encountering it at the Chelsea Flower Show in 2004, we brought it back, and it has since become one of the most beloved tools in our lineup. The Thornett Trowel is a more recent addition. Garden designer Sid Hill found the curved hand trowel in the shed of his late grandmother, Janet. In 2024, he used it to create the Microbiome Garden at the Chelsea Flower Show, and that garden won gold. Together with Sid, we created a Sneeboer version of it, named after her.
Friends of Sneeboer
Rosie Atkins, then editor-in-chief of Gardens Illustrated, met Wilma and Jaap in 1997 at Bingerden. Stephanie Harrod from England and Anne Schreck of The Garden Tool Company in Texas explain how a business relationship grew into a friendship. You’ll also read about the ten rose spades we forged for Theresa Hildebrandt, the Steinfurther Rose Queen, and garden designer Carien van Boxtel wraps up with her love for Sneeboer.
Read issue 2 of Tools & Tales below, in Dutch or in English.