Joseph Marples Carpenter’s Mallet

A traditional mallet, made from beech wood in the Sheffield workshops of Joseph Marples. With a large, flat sided, tapered head which measures approximately 12cm x 8.8cm x 5.5cm, an overall length of about 33.5cm and an overall weight of around 450g. At the turn of the 20th century the city of Sheffield was littered with an abundance of small scale tool manufacturers — the little mesters. Today very few of these survive lost to mergers, takeovers, outsourcing, and ultimately cheaper mass-produced imports. A few though do remain, fiercely independent companies, proud of their history, their products, and their skills. One such is Joseph Marples, makers of this all beech carpenter’s mallet and currently run by Joseph Anthony Marples, the sixth in a line of Josephs stretching back to their founding in 1840.