Of Thorn & Briar: A Year with the West Country Hedgelayer by Paul Lamb
Simon & Schuster, 2025
While hedgelaying is not unique to England, hedges (and drystone walls) are often seen as emblematic of the English countryside, with many enthusiasts including the National Hedgelaying Society, which is run by a team of volunteers who provide information on all aspects of hedgelaying on their website. The original purpose of hedges was to contain livestock, and there are now about thirty different hedge styles within Britain as a whole.Christopher Hart, author ofHedgelands, believes that the first hedges were dead ones, a more informal type thought to have been used in the Neolithic era before the emergence of permanent boundaries. Hedges of dead wood break down relatively quickly and become fertile ground for nettles and seedlings, attracting insects and consequently birds, whose droppings include the seeds of further trees and shrubs. Saplings for live hedges, which have been evidenced in some form or other since the Bronze Age, would have been sourced from the scrub- and woodland, the type available differing from county to county, although hawthorn and blackthorn were readily available in many locations. Hart references the historian Oliver Rackham, who observes that Devon stone-faced hedges are one of the oldest built items still in use for their original purpose.(Incidentally, the most ancient hedgerow in England, over nine hundred years old, is known as ‘Judith’s Hedge,’ located near Monks Wood in Cambridgeshire. The Judith in question is believed to have been William the Conqueror’s niece Judith of Lens.) I have a long-standing interest in gardening and nature, so when I found Paul Lamb’s reels on social media as ‘the West Country Hedgelayer,’ I found it comforting and satisfying to watch his demonstrations of an old and important craft. The recent release of Lamb’s book Of Thorn & Briar therefore provided a perfect opportunity to learn more about this countryside skill and its most famous practitioner.
At twenty-one Lamb became a father, which motivated him to find a regular living for himself and his family after previous seasonal work as a farm labourer and distributor of firewood. He and his then-wife were based in Dorset, where he began an informal apprenticeship to the woodsman Bill Bugler. One part of this work was hedgelaying and, appropriately, the first type of hedge that Lamb mastered was the Dorset style. By now Lamb has accumulated around three decades of hedgelaying experience all over the West Country. Over the last five years he has lived alone in his wagon, travelling to weeks- or months-long projects: Of Thorn & Briar chronicles one calendar year spent roaming Devon, Cornwall, Dorset, and Wiltshire in this way. Over this period Lamb procured work from rural homeowners as well as from farmers and smallholders, and in these small communities word of mouth brought him extra custom, although he was also sometimes judged for his itinerant lifestyle and his wagon. This vehicle was largely utilitarian, containing purposely pared-down living quarters, but he also had a small library of old books on countryside and woodland crafts, and a collection of clay tobacco pipes and Victorian glass bottles. Lamb only collected and stored enough firewood to drive with, and he had a system to ensure sufficient water storage at all times. In April 2026, however, he announced that he is selling his old mobile home and making a fresh start.
Lamb’s working season starts in September, since trees and shrubs are generally dormant from autumn until April, enabling them to be cut without damage. The rest of the year, in addition to hedgelaying, involves him in assisting friends and acquaintances with other work in exchange for a wagon-pitch. Early rising is standard, and Lamb describes his daily progress using tools including billhooks, axes, and modern chainsaws, so that the book is essentially a countryside journal. His narrativetakes us through the various processes of hedgelaying. There are no photographs, so that the reader may have difficulty visualising all the stages, but the attempt to do so is enjoyable.
The process of hedgelaying has a pleasing, methodical logic.As a prerequisite, it requires an assessment of the current state of the boundary, trees, and gaps. Any detritus such as old fence wire, litter and dead plant materials will be discarded or recycled and any suitable wood will be stored for firewood. Laying the hedge involves the partial cutting of vertical stems, maintaining their connection to their roots, followed by bending them to allow for more horizontal regrowth, thus eventually creating a tough, impenetrable barrier. The structure is further supported by stakes, vertical posts often made of hazel, which protect the integrity of the laid hedge. This is followed by new saplings and an inspection of the hedge in the following season to replenish any hedging that has not survived. A hedge needs to be actively managed over the first three to five years, and must be relaid every fifteen to twenty years. An unmaintained hedge will become uneven, with vertical growth taking over when the branches are not pleached, and will ultimately evolve into a line of tall trees with insufficient density to serve its purpose.
Each county or region in which Lamb works has its own distinct geology, microclimate, and hedgelaying approach. There are the Midland style, an upright, robust, and most attractive form created to contain cattle, the Hampshire, Surrey, and Buckinghamshire shapes, developed for penning in sheep, and the Devon model, which evolved to integrate the famous stone walls. Depending on the intended usage, a laid hedge may be double or single brushed: double brushing is employed when there are livestock on either side of the hedge, so that both sides need to be strong, functional, and suit the animals that they contain. Although hedges are practical structures, they are also attractive and sculptural, and dressing both sides in this way adds to their aesthetic appeal, which often improves over time. In addition to the regional forms, each individual hedgelayer will have a signature style, so that in some cases you can recognise not only your general location but the hedgelayer from the hedge’s appearance.
Containing lessons learned from thirty years of hedgelaying, this book is brimming with observations of the natural world and the history of countryside practices, enhanced with wood engravings by Robin Mackenzie. Living on the land in a wagon, Lamb finds that the changing light and seasons affect him more directly, and although modernity does flicker in occasionally, the book mostly feels timeless. We read of the importance of gatherings and brew-ups, multi-generational knowledge generously shared around a bonfire or in a pub with kindred spirits, some of whom Lamb quotes in the local dialect. It is a simple life but one which offers alternative rewards, most importantly the knowledge of what is truly important.
This world of rural activity may sound irresistibly romantic, but beyond the camaraderie of shared meals and cider there is a lot of hard graft, considerable uncertainty and, occasionally, loss. Diversification in farming has now become ubiquitous in an attempt to buffer risk, but even so, sometimes things simply don’t work out. Lamb relates the sad tale of a local family forced to sell the farm to which they have been attached for generations, not only an economic setback but the obliteration of part of that family’s history. Life is sometimes difficult for Lamb himself, with melancholy creeping in due to the isolation of solitary work. Overall, however, creating something slowly that then develops further gives Lamb a profound sense of purpose in his time and place and a positive feeling of connection.
Absurdly, but perhaps inevitably, the book left me wondering what Lamb would make of my own mixed shrub hedge. I live in a relatively modern suburban house from the 1990s and when I moved in I wanted a boundary for my front garden, which previously was just lawn with no border.One of my friends, an aspiring archaeologist, had sparked my interest in hedgerows by telling me about Hooper’s Rule, which posits that the number of woody plant species found within a thirty-metre length of hedge can be used to determine its age: all the species of tree and shrub are counted and then multiplied by 100 or 110, to gauge how many centuries old the hedge is. I found this a fascinating concept and was inspired to create my own wildlife hedge, albeit a more modern one and not a laid hedge. I have, of course, made mistakes and the hedge has evolved over time, but it does seem to appeal to the local fauna.
Of Thorn and Briar is a beautiful, generous book, well written by a knowledgeable and pragmatic man who left school at sixteen with no qualifications. It is a fascinating account of an ancient craft, and Lamb is a sympathetic advocate for the continuance of this and other related skills, such as thatching, hurdle-making, coppicing, and charcoal and firewood production. The transmission of knowledge seems to be important to Lamb, and perhaps this will inform his next chapter.--Kate Morton
We are very happy to welcome KateMorton to the Albion team. Kate originally comes from Loughborough, enjoys literature, non-fiction, gardening, cooking and baking, and is a professional bookseller. --The Editor
