Thanks to Victoria and Richard of The Fender Boat for making my new bow button. It looks superb, is solid rope (they assure me - I wouldn't know unless I unravelled it myself - and really adds character to the pointy end. A bow button isn't much, in knotting terms, but they've added two 'Turk's Heads' as decoration, and it does add eye appeal. There's one Turk's Head around the circumference, and another longitudinally.
Cost: £38.50 for the plain button, £5 extra for each Turk's Head, and £8 for the various shackles and hook thingies. Total £56.50. Very good value, very good work.
They said they only put two Turk's Heads on their own bow button so as to show people you could have it one of two ways, but I asked them to do the same to mine. Apparently I'm the only other person to have it the way they have theirs, so mine's a collector's item.
Here's a photo of Victoria making Granny Button's new bow button. She did the main 'button' bit, while Richard did the Turk's Heads.
That's the traditional division of labour on the waterways. The women do the tough chores (lockwheeling, washing, cooking, sewing, ropework etc), while the men take over the fun bits (steering, knotwork, photographing the women making bow buttons).
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