About Us

Classic Hand Tools Ltd (CHT) was formed in 2003. We are based in Needham Market, Suffolk "At the Sign Of The 3 Golden Planes", a small shop in the High Street.

CHT is solely owned and managed by Mike Hancock who has been involved with the sale of quality hand tools for over fifteen years.

The CHT staff are as follows;

Alex Primmer our shop and mail order sales manager. Alex is the always cheerful and helpful person who runs the shop. Alex has taken basic woodworking courses with John Lloyd, has product training with Tormek, Veritas, Miller Dowel, The Guinevere/Kirjes Sanding System & Robert Sorby Tools. He has also completed his first Windsor chair under the tutelage of James Mursell at The Windsor Workshop. This chair is in the shop for you to try out when you visit!

David Thornton tried to retire from work but having taken a year long cabinet making course he was spending far too much time in our shop so we thought we may as well employ him. David is pretty darn good on the Tormek system and the Gifkins Boxmakers Jig. David helps out in the shop and at shows.

Mary Hancock is our super efficient accounts lady and wanabee woodcarver.

Joy Allen is another wanabee woodcarver who helps us with our marketing. Joy and Mary are heading off to West Dean soon to develop their woodcarving skills.

CHT endeavours to support small independent tool makers and likes to promote their products to a wider audience through this web site, trade shows and their mail order catalogue.

Some famous names appear on this site, Lie-Nielsen, Clifton, Robert Sorby, Brusso, Norton, Ron Hock etc. However CHT recognises the excellence of smaller, less well known concerns and will try to promote their tools through this site. We have added Blue Spruce Toolworks, Gransfors Bruks & Woodjoy Tools to our stable of tools in recent months.

As this site grows it will feature more small independent makers. Of course, we have to sell the products to make it viable! We hope you enjoy shopping on our site and look forward to receiving your custom.

SHOP - we are open 10am - 5pm Monday to Friday and 10am - 3pm on Saturday (except when we have in store demonstrations - enough standing room for about 10 people! then we generally open 9am - 5pm).  Actually Alex is often at the shop until 7pm in the evening so please call us at any time.

OLD TOOLS - For those of you who only ever want to use old tools in their work and have a specific requirement for an old tool - please let me know and we will try and find it for you. We have many contacts in the antique and collectable tool market and will be pleased to help. We do buy old tools - give us a call first to discuss before making the trip to Needham Market.  We also do house calls when we are in your area.