A Dedicated Life

For his miniature work, Graham has tried and tested all sorts of tools, but his tools of choice are very fine late 19th century needles which he bought in a batch from an antique dealer in the 1980s. With eyes made from pure gold, the antique needles enable the highest levels of craftsmanship.

Graham's engraving craftsmanship also sees him produce the finest die-stamped stationery, using a hand-engraving technique dating from the 1500s. By the 17th century, master engravers enjoyed rock-star status, with artists including Dürer and Robert Nanteuil elevating the status of engraving to rival painting and sculpture. Nowadays, the required image is engraved into a steel die or copper plate, then acid-etched after photographic exposure.

Now in his mid-sixties, Graham likes to be in top physical condition for his often gruelling work, which involves his engraving arm being tightly attached to his workbench with a leather luggage strap, only his fingertips free to move. He swims 5,000 metres every day, which has resulted in a resting pulse rate of 30 beats per minute. Graham's skill is so demanding that he aims for engraving strokes between heart beats, wearing a medical stethoscope for monitoring, as the pulse creates movements that affect the steadiness of the hand. Any movement around the building also affects Graham's hand, including  vibrations from passing lorries. One single vibration can cause the graver to slip across the pin head and obliterate several words at a time, causing Graham to start his painstaking work all over again.

The Lord's Prayer gold pin head took an estimated 300 hours and 1,841 separately-engraved strokes to complete. Having experimented with 200 steel pins first, Graham settled on gold because the brittle steel pins caused the lettering to flake, whereas gold is stable to work with and doesn't corrode. When engraving for the royal palaces, Graham continues the centuries-old master engravers' tradition of starting at 10 o'clock in the evening and working through the night. Graham sees the ritual as a romantic bond with craftspeople down the ages.