The area around Haystack has half a dozen high quality craft galleries, representing work of locals, visitors and school's faculty. The predominant industry, however, is lobster fishing. The first America's Cup crew came from Deer Isle. Road-signs demonstrate the bone dry local humour: a local restaurant advertises 'Lousy food & warm beer'. Haystack seems to have acquired that air of laidback resilience.

Haystack participants come from three walks of life. Such is the regard for Haystack, that the professional students include previous instructors. They are joined by people who've moved into Maine just to be near Haystack, and stressed high-achievers wanting manual relaxation. Despite different degrees of experience, there is little evidence of hierarchy during the fortnight. One possible reason for this is the American ritual of summer camp, where children learn to pitch in together for several weeks each year.

The work ethic was intense, but exhilarating. Half way through the session, we had a special picnic, where we sat on warmed granite boulders, eating local lobster, watching the sun set over the bay. Rather than continue carousing until sunrise next day, the conversations idled back to the workshops, where the day's work gleefully re-commenced. The usual social prohibition on work was gleefully abandoned.

As writer-in-residence, it was my task to conduct writing workshops and produce a long essay for their annual monograph. While there, I mined conversations with those whose work exists outside craft. There's much to be learned about the contemporary relevance of manual arts from those who come to it for relief from an increasingly abstract work experience. One particularly rich vein of understanding came from an excellent wood-design student whose day job was to render fur on digital animations such as Babe. The solitude of wood provided necessary relief from the hive-like work inside computer systems.