AGAINST THE GRAIN

WOODWORKER SOPHIE SELLU HAS CARVED A CAREER FOR HERSELF CREATING TACTILE HANDMADE HOMEWARES FROM WOOD THAT MIGHT OTHERWISE GO TO WASTE

Sitting in her studio, knife in hand, carving away at a bit of reclaimed walnut, Sophie Sellu is not your average woodworker.

Surrounded by chippings and beautifully crafted spoons, chopping boards, brushes and vases, Sophie works alone, apart from her whippet Stanley and a podcast for company. After all, you can’t afford to be distracted when you’re swinging an axe or slicing into wood with an obscenely sharp knife. This solitude gives her the space to create bespoke homewares from recycled wood, admired by the likes of Nigella Lawson and which you may have spotted in the pages of recipe books or on the tables of restaurants.

While Sophie has been interested in woodwork since school, it wasn’t the career she originally followed. After graduating with a degree in design, she began working in visual merchandising. But struggling to be truly creative at work, she signed up to workshops to try new skills – including a spoon-carving course, which changed her life. “I spent eight hours carving a spoon in a forest in Sussex – I loved every minute of it,” she explains. “In just one day I’d created an item I could hold in my hand. I’d made something useful, and I wanted to make more.”

Still working full time and living with her parents in west London, she spent every spare minute teaching herself how to carve and sculpt, gradually moving on from simple spoons to more complicated carvings. “I’d sit in the living room getting wood chips everywhere. My parents were just pleased I was doing something I enjoyed, although there were a couple of times where I had to say, ‘I think you’re going to have to drive me to A&E because I’ve cut myself again’. Considering how clumsy I am, I may have chosen the wrong profession!”

Sophie started out working with green wood – easier to cut due to its high moisture content – but struggling to find a constant source led her down a new path. “I started scouring eBay for old bits of furniture to use. Luckily, my uncle is a builder who works on renovation projects and could get me lots of reclaimed wood.

“Using reclaimed wood means what I make is dictated by the size of the offcut I have, but, rather than it being a constraint, it means everything is unique and has its own history. I love giving a new lease of life to something that’s been deemed waste.”

"CONSIDERING HOW CLUMSY I AM, I MAY BE IN THE WRONG PROFESSION"

After a year of honing her skills, and having been made redundant from her day job, Sophie decided to take the plunge and launched her brand Grain & Knot. With some help from

The Prince’s Trust, she set herself up with tools and a website and set to work, initially selling through Instagram, then through markets. Her business quickly gathered pace as she began to be stocked in independent stores. Then Nigella bought some of her items. “That was a bit of a shock!” she says. “I kept thinking, ‘I’ll give it a few more months,’ but I soon realised it could actually be my proper job.”

Handcrafting everything herself is hugely time consuming. “Some days I’ll only carve for a couple of hours and on others I’ll do 15 hours straight and go to bed at 3am. »