Bernard wins Emerging Metalworker of the Year Award 2025

Northern Ireland plasterer Bernard Cunningham has won the third annual Emerging Metalworker of the Year Award, supported through a donation by Lucy and Laurence Butcher, including a £1,000 prize awarded at a special presentation at Wentworth Woodhouse on Monday 17 November 2025.

The award, now in its third year, celebrates an emerging metalworker who has made an outstanding start to their craft career. The winner is highly skilled amongst their peers, whilst raising the perceived value of their craft through sharing and awareness raising. They have given themselves a fantastic chance of achieving long-term success, perhaps overcoming disadvantage or setbacks along the way.

Bernard Cunningham is a traditional plasterer with 37 years’ experience, but his nomination was for his emerging business crafting bespoke, stainless-steel metal tools for heritage and fibrous plastering. The tools, which include hard-to-find items for scagliola and pargetting, cannot be bought in shops, and he is now expanding his range and planning to open a training facility for the next generation.

The three other finalists for the award were Claire Collier, an exceptional blacksmith who successfully transitioned careers from primary school teaching to pursue her passion for metalwork, and who has appeared on BBC Make it at Market, Rebecca Oldfield, who blends traditional silversmithing with contemporary design to create innovative, high-standard pieces, as well as serving on the committee of Contemporary British Silversmiths, and Bradley Stuart Wills, an artist blacksmith who has been named ‘one to watch’ by both the Guild of Enamellers and the Goldsmiths’ Centre, and has starred on Sky Arts’ Bill Bailey’s Master Crafters.

Photo: Bernard Cunningham, winner of the 2025 Emerging Metalworker of the Year Award, and Nicola Duncan-Finn, Heritage Crafts Trustee. Photo by Robert Wade.