Learning at our shop

We don’t offer formal instruction or classes at the moment. The best way to get started with us is to come out to a shop day. There’s almost always someone around who’s happy to show you how to light and manage a coal fire, get you comfortable with a hammer, and walk you through a simple first project. It’s informal, everyone learns at their own pace, and you’ll pick up a lot just by watching the other smiths.

If it’s your first time, have a look at what to bring to your first meet and how to find our shop before you come.

If you want formal classes

If you’d rather have structured lessons, here are a few options we recommend:

Iron Sunset Forge

Henrietta, one of our guild members, teaches blacksmithing classes at Iron Sunset Forge. Check her website for upcoming class dates.

NAIT Continuing Education

NAIT in Edmonton runs a series of part-time blacksmithing courses at its main campus, starting with IRON101 Blacksmithing, where you make your own punch, hammer and tongs. From there you can go on to intermediate blacksmithing, a course on axes and hatchets, or a five-day blacksmithing bootcamp. See the full list of NAIT blacksmithing courses. Classes tend to fill up, so register early.

Front Step Forge

Shawn Cunningham has run Front Step Forge in Edmonton since 1992, and he’s the instructor for the NAIT courses above. His classes page has the latest on what he’s teaching and when.