The second Tools & Tales is all about the women behind Sneeboer

The second edition of Tools & Tales is out. This time, the women in and around our trade take center stage. Fair's fair, writes Laura Sneeboer in her foreword: it was about time too.

On the cover are Wilma, Laura and Noa. Grandmother, mother and daughter, all three connected to the forge in Bovenkarspel where we have made garden tools since 1913.

Craftsmanship has many faces

Sneeboer is made by people, and far from only by the smiths in the workshop. Lilian talks about almost thirty years at the company, from answering the phone to the webshop orders she now sends all over the world. During the 2020 lockdown, Elsa came up with the idea of delivering webshop orders by horse and cart. And for years, Wilma Peelen was the familiar face of Sneeboer, now known at Chelsea as the Queen of Chelsea. Did you know that since May, for the first time in 113 years, a woman has been working in our workshop? Sophie combines her work with us with a three-year vocational training course.

Two trowels with a story

The Flowerbed Trowel already featured in the 1899 catalogue of the English company Suttons. After a meeting at the Chelsea Flower Show in 2004, we brought it back, and it's now one of the best loved tools in our range. The Thornett Trowel is younger. Garden designer Sid Hill found the curved trowel in the shed of his late grandmother Janet. In 2024, he used it to build the Microbiome Garden at the Chelsea Flower Show, and that garden won gold. Together with Sid, we made a Sneeboer version of it, named after her.

Friends of Sneeboer

Rosie Atkins, editor of Gardens Illustrated at the time, met Wilma and Jaap in 1997 at Bingerden. Stephanie Harrod from England and Anne Schreck of The Garden Tool Company in Texas talk about how a business relationship grew into a friendship. You can also read about the ten rose spades we forged for Theresa Hildebrandt, the Steinfurther Rose Queen, and garden designer Carien van Boxtel closes with her love for Sneeboer.

Read Tools & Tales issue 2 below, in Dutch or in English.