We all love a good story. For hundreds of years – before the days of radios, TVs and the internet – people would gather across the Peak District, reciting tall tales and local legends to groups of peers and family.
These were passed from one generation to the next, frequently mutating and becoming more outlandish in the process.
One man who has been collecting these local folktales and repackaging them in an interesting and unique way is 27-year-old Joe Winstanley, author of Folks Book One which came out in 2023, and the recently-published successor Book Two (with Book Three to follow).
Joe has combed through books, archives, websites and his own family lore to uncover these tales, rewritten some to incorporate a 21st century perspective for added resonance and, remarkably, illustrated them with photographs of intricate miniature landscape models he has constructed.
Joe grew up in Hathersage, experiencing an idyllic childhood and teenage years with the Peak District on the doorstep.
‘I loved growing up there – one of the best experiences’, he reflects.
‘Our playground was Stanage. We played in rivers. The smell of bracken now is my childhood link, because it was so deeply entwined into us. Having that as a way to explore and find independence was amazing.’
Things took a darker turn when Joe moved away to attend university to study criminology, a subject he now acknowledges was ‘never in line with what I wanted out of life really – at the time I thought it was’.
After 18 months experiencing depression and anxiety, he dropped out and returned home.
As he describes, ‘my body basically brought me home and said, “You’re not doing this anymore”. In reality, I was probably supressing quite a lot of stuff I hadn’t dealt with.’
Having returned to the Hope Valley, Joe felt initially ‘at a bit of a wit’s end’. This was not how he expected university to pan out, characterising himself as an extrovert until that point.
Joe Winstanley at work in his studio Photo: Richard Bradley ‘My friends had gone,’ he recalls, ‘and were still in that university world, living a life I was kind of jealous of, and kind of wanted, but physically and mentally didn’t have the capacity to do at that time. So, I was the one back home, on my own, feeling like a bit of a ghost of myself’.
The familiar landscape of the Peak District, however, proved restorative.
‘I came back to Hathersage, which fairly quickly became my place of solace and refuge,’ he explains.
‘I’d go off on my own into the woods, crags, and rivers I’d grown up with – but now with a different perspective, and purpose.
‘I started finding a lot of spirituality in the Peak District – exploring various means and methods of understanding myself: Buddhism, Daoism, personal belief structures, breathing methods, meditation, mindfulness, and just generally being out there walking. I started to become deeply connected with nature.’
Around this time Joe was working on a clothing company called District, with designs printed onto t-shirts inspired by the topography of various landscapes.
‘We developed that clothing company, which didn’t work out,’ he concedes. ‘It was a big learning curve that cost quite a bit of money.’
One element from this unsuccessful venture, however, has been incorporated into his current Folks project.
‘Whilst working on District, I was exploring packaging development concepts – the idea was to make a parcel that would look like the Peak District when folded,’ he explains.
‘That’s where my paper landscapes emerged, as a piece of marketing material, and project packaging development’.
The genesis of Folks stemmed from the online reaction to an early model piece of Joe’s.
Having posted a photograph on Instagram, someone commented asking whereabouts exactly in the Peak District this entity could be found.
‘I replied with a myth – along the lines of, “unfortunately this monument has been buried over time and you can’t find it, but let me know if you find its whereabouts.”
‘I became fascinated that in this modern world, you could make a myth up about something, and it has some tangible quality to it where you couldn’t say “That’s wrong”, or “that’s right”. It makes anything valid.
‘I got really interested in what other stories were out there in the Peak District and how could I bring them to life through modelmaking and various means.
In keeping with the ephemeral nature of his work, Joe tends to recycle the materials from each model and incorporate them into the next.
‘It’s quite nice that one model will have a life in another’, he muses, ‘only I really know that. I like the impermanence of it.’
Joe only preserves pieces he’s particularly proud of, like the tree spirit figures which illustrate a tale about Stanton Moor’s Nine Ladies stone circle in Book Two.
However, he remains open to the idea of an exhibition at some point and hopes to stage some storytelling events in the future.
‘I’d like to, because it draws people in. If people see something physical, their reaction to anything miniature is to look closer and spend more time with it.’
‘The final story is The Visitor. It’s about my experience of mental health,’ explains Joe.
‘I’ve made a model of Castleton Visitor Centre, which I used to clean – my first job when I came back from university.
‘I was in a very weird, anxious state of mind. I’m playing the role as the haunter, looking back – it’s about taking time to look into the past and put your past version of yourself on the right track, but also to look forward and look out for your future self. I enjoyed writing that one, that was quite cathartic’.
One curious aspect of Joe’s own story is the link his practice provides to his late grandad John, a stonemason and Chester-Le-Street native who came down to the Hope Valley to work on the construction of the reservoirs, employed at Hope’s cement works.
Whilst Joe never knew his grandad – he died the year after he was born – something appears to have been passed down.
The first story in Folks Book One, ‘The Collaboration’, consisting solely of a single image, explores this synchronicity.
After his gran died, Joe found one of his grandad’s terrariums in the loft whilst the family were clearing out the house.
It was in a poor state but Joe took it, cleaned it up and created a scene involving miniature versions of himself and his grandad meeting inside the terrarium and appreciating each other’s work.
‘So, it’s finishing his work, as a 70-year-old folk story which doesn’t have any words and is deeply connected to my heritage; it’s using his models now to make my models,’ Joe explains.
‘It’s nice to pursue a craft he was interested in. It’s a connection to him. It would be interesting to know if he was making those things for his mental health; would that have been a thing back then? Would the vocabulary have been there?
‘I can’t quite get into his headspace of why he made these things. Because the process would be the same – you’d get the same benefit from it’.
In a fast-paced world, Joe’s slow, methodical way of realising his visions feels admirable.
‘I see it as a privilege now, experiencing what I did at 20’, Joe muses philosophically.
‘It’s a young age to go through something like that – but most who experience a mental health crisis are below 25 these days. It’s a rising thing, probably because our awareness of it’s increased too. I learnt patience through having to go through an experience like that’.
‘I can have an idea but know it won’t form until two years later, until I’ve learnt the necessary skills, knowing this project is quite long-term,’ says Joe.
‘I might not be able to access one element straight away, but then, three years down the line, I’ll be doing something I thought of three years before.
‘The base level of my art is understanding these things take time. I think that comes from just spending time in nature – nature takes a lot of time. So you have to kind of slow yourself down’.
‘People are wanting that slower way’, he concludes. ‘They want more community – to gather and hear more stories and tell their own.’
Folks Books One and Two are available from studioskai.co.uk, Edale General Stores, Hathersage Craft Shop and Novel bookshop, Sheffield.
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