Historic Trades & Skills

These trades include carpenters, who use hand tools to transform trees into lumber, cut and raise timber building frames, and provide finishes; joiners, who produce finish work for buildings including doors, windows, shutters, and cupboards; cabinetmakers, who fashion intricate details of luxury products with hand tools; harpsichord makers, who build stringed keyboard musical instruments; coopers, who transform flat boards into barrels; and wheelwrights, who combine wood and iron to make functional vehicle wheels. 

The apparel tradespeople of Colonial Williamsburg are masters of 18th-century wardrobing. Weavers transform flax, cotton, and wool into precise fabrics; milliners create fine accessories; tailors measure and fit clothing for folks throughout the city; leather breeches makers create leather breeches for men and boys; shoemakers make footwear by hand; and wigmakers fashion statement-making headpieces. 

Our farm to table trades work throughout the year to grow food for the community and to prepare the grounds as needed for the seasons to come. Historic cooks work in locations throughout the Historic Area preparing authentic colonial dishes; gardeners grow vegetables, herbs, and flowers, and maintain our Sankofa Heritage Garden and our Three Sisters Gardens; and farmers grows large-scale crops in the farming plot near the windmill.

Metalworking trades throughout the colonial capital work to support the operation of the town as well as the War for Independence. Blacksmiths forge hot iron into a variety of tools, weapons, and hardware; the foundry casts objects from metal; the gunsmith creates arms for the community; engravers create custom inscriptions and designs for metal objects; Tin Plate Workers shape lightweight tools and utensils; and silversmiths create symbols of wealth and status.

Some of our skilled craftsman practice very specialized trades, including apothecaries, who share how medicine, wellness, and surgical practices of today compare with those of the 18th century; bookbinders, who specialize in the time-consuming skill of binding books, a luxury only few could afford; printers, mass communicators of the 18th century; and brick masons, who turn soft clay into solid foundations.