CHARLES COLLIS

I was studying Double Bass at Goldsmiths University when I realised I wanted to make instruments rather than play them. After a time at Newark School of  Violin Making I worked making new basses for Thomas Martin, Oxfordshire. I was then very privileged to to gain a Scholarship from QEST to study with some of the best makers and restorers in the UK which lead to working for the gifted Colin Irving as his assistant. Colin was an institution in himself. I am ever grateful to him and his wife Christine who both taught me so much.

In 2012 we set up our workshop in Salisbury where we began a very serious and intense period of restoration and making instruments for professional players world-wide. As the making of basses  demanded a bigger working space my wife, Marie and I moved our growing family to rural Warwickshire. Our new working environment has given us the enriching space to make more instruments.