Patt Gregory's first experience woodworking was with other women in a Bristol lounge room in 1986. She's been chasing that feeling ever since.
"I'd been working in the UK as a private detective trying to get some sort of zhoosh into my life, some excitement," Patt says.
"But it didn't quite do it for me.
"I saw an ad in the Bristol Evening Post that said 'woodwork for women'."
Brought up on a farm with two brothers, Patt who is aged 70, didn't get much of a chance to do the exciting things they did.
"I thought 'Oh, this would be amazing. I'd love to do something like this'," Patt says.
"So I went along and it was in a lady's lounge room on the first floor of her little flat."
She recalls the amazing sensation of the smell of wood, and the calmness of the women.
"And I just fell in love with it and then wanted to train as a carpenter joiner.
"I went home to tell my flatmates and … they all fell about laughing."
The training back then was government funded — a three year apprenticeship packed into an intensive workshop.
"I was in that workshop with six or seven lads. I was 30 and they were sort of all in their early 20s," Patt says.
"But I wasn't very good at it, I found that I struggled with the tools and the measuring and marking out and the boys seemed to get it after about three weeks.
"When they'd go to morning tea, I'd have a bit of a cry. Because I really didn't know what was going on."
Regardless, she pushed through, learning everything from stair casing and roofing to door making and fitting.
Soon after graduating she started teaching others at a government-funded workshop to get women into trades.
"That's been my passion ever since. I came back to Australia and started a business and that was it," Patt says.
Over the course of 26 years she's taught thousands of women the basics of woodworking and power tools from her home in Mullumbimby, in the Northern Rivers region of NSW.
"They come because they love wood. That is the stitch that binds them all together. That is the base thing that everyone agrees on," Patt says.
"[And] they just want to be able to build stuff. How things go together, how to buy wood."
"They're sick of asking their hubby or their partner to make the coffee table or do this or that."
She finds people want to get out of their heads and into working with their hands.
A lot of the training is offering those nuances and subtleties that Patt missed out on.
"When things are broken down into small steps, you feel like you can absorb it, and you don't walk away overwhelmed."
It's a style student TJ Rowan, has appreciated.
"The way she teaches is very empowering. She doesn't assume any kind of knowledge," TJ says.
"She tells you the absolute basics like on the hand position and your body position when holding a drill."
TJ did come with some experience, having assisted her dad renovate houses as a kid.
"Even though I had confidence around the tools there was this big gap in knowledge," TJ says.
"When she shows you how to use a tool she never takes it all away from you. You're really quite empowered because you've always got the tool in your hand.
"She's a real cheerleader. That's her personality."
TJ picked up Patt's course when she moved from Sydney to the Byron Bay region six years ago.
"I ended up getting a job with a painter, so I was around other trades. And I was really drawn back to woodworking," TJ says.
"And I wanted to learn from a woman, I thought it would be nice."
After attending a few workshops, TJ's now setting up her own woodwork school with Patt's help.
Patt says she's seen the industry evolve since the 80s, particularly in terms of female representation across the trade.
"In the 60s and 70s women were on front covers of handyman magazines. They admittedly often had a paintbrush in their hands, but at the same time they were very much part of doing a home," Patt says.
"And of course women were so prolific in the war effort but that all got shoved under the carpet as soon as the lads came home."
Now, things are changing.
"It feels like we have an equal footing in that we have the opportunity to go into the trades. And it's our job to really push through," Patt says.
"So we want women to come and learn woodwork. We want women to think about it as a trade and build houses and tiny houses and chook sheds."
It's a desire that is out there, as TJ keeps finding.
"There seems to be a lot of women who want to get into [it] but for whatever reason don't. Maybe it's fear or a gender role thing, they feel like it's unavailable to them. But it's not."
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