Chain & Furlong is two people and a drawing board in a converted byre on Ash Hill. Iris Halloway surveys. Tom Fenwick letters and inks.
Between us we have made maps of a Pennine sheep farm, a Wharfedale wedding, a walk that took a man forty years to finish, and a Sheffield allotment with every rhubarb crown marked. Each one began with boots on the ground and ended with a sheet of Fabriano paper, drawn by hand with a dip pen.
We do not trace satellite imagery. If a hedge is on the map, one of us has stood next to it. When the sheet is finished we walk it across the ground with you, so we can be sure the wall you remember is the wall we drew.
IH
Iris HallowaySurveyor
Walks every yard of a commission at least twice. Owns four compasses and trusts one of them.
TF
Tom FenwickLetterer and inker
Hand-letters every name on the sheet. Has strong views on the italic ampersand and will share them.
What a commission costs
from £1,800a single sheet at A2, surveyed and drawn
£2,400 to £4,000where most finished maps land
£280 to £460framing, by a joiner in the next valley
10 to 14 weeksfrom the first walk to the last
The price depends on the size of the ground and how much survey walking it needs. An allotment is two days on site. An estate is three weeks. We take six commissions a season and there are three places left for autumn 2026.
Where to find us
The byre is at the top of the lane from Ninepins Farm. There is no sign. If you reach the trig pillar on Long Rigg you have gone too far, though the view is worth it. Visits are by appointment, so begin a commission or write to studio@chainandfurlong.co.uk.
A selection from the eleven sheets we have drawn since 2024. Every one was surveyed on foot and every name on it was chosen by the person who asked for it.
Short pieces from the notebook, mostly composed on the churchyard bench at Cold Kirk while waiting for rain to stop. Each one has a place. Follow the link and the sheet will take you there.
The beck runs under alders for a quarter of a mile below the mill and you hear it long before you see it. We surveyed it by sound, walking the bank with the wheel and stopping every twenty paces to listen for the change in note where it drops over stone.
The map shows a blue line. The blue line is mostly listening.
Mrs Ackroyd at Ninepins was certain the hawthorn along Long Meadow had always been there. The tithe map disagreed. We drew what is there now, because that is the job, but we lettered the field with its older name, which she had not heard said aloud since her grandmother.
One night of snow and the rigg gives away every wall footing, sunken lane and old drain in the morning light. We take the day off from whatever we are supposed to be doing and walk with a notebook until it melts.
Half of the best detail on our own sheet came from three such mornings.
A surveyor's chain is sixty six feet of steel links and a nuisance to carry. Ten chains make a furlong, eighty make a mile, and ten square chains make an acre, which is why the fields on old maps come out in such tidy numbers.
We use it perhaps twice a year, mostly to remind ourselves what the words on the door mean.