It all started quite by accident. In the Czech Republic in 2008, 2 friends David Shane Vejmělka and Pavel Pavlis Kaláb made themselves shields for HMB fights, and their teammates saw and asked them to make shields for the whole team, and thus the workshop Výroba štítů \ Shields Manufacturing was born. As soon as we announced the start of the Artisans and Craftsmen People’s Choice Award competition, messages with offers to nominate this workshop came pouring in. How could we ignore them? Of course, the Výroba štítů workshop takes part in our competition for the HMBIA quality mark, and we are happy to tell you about it to those who are not yet familiar with the crafters and their products.

“Since 2008 we have produced shields for almost all styles of fencing and for all epochs when shields were used, but as a workshop we started a bit later. Over the years of manufacturing the shields, we did a lot of types of shields – from the Celts to the end of the Middle Ages, LARP, fantasy and of course for HMB, which we enjoyed a lot.

We started with HMB as shield manufactures, starting with the World Championships in Trogir, where we sold our shields. HMB got in our blood. Our shields are used by fighters on all continents of the world”, said David Shane Vejmělka.

Both masters are experienced fencers. David has been fencing for 27 years, and Pavel for 22 years. All these years they have been using shields in battles and training, so they make shields up to their own high standards.

“We have so many experiences with fencing with a shield from this time. The most important thing for us is to use quality materials, processing and endurance of shields. We are trying to make our shields so high quality withstand the toughest buhurts”.

In the course of their work, craftsmen communicate with clients. In truth, it’s not always easy, but David and Pavel always find a common language with customers. However, there are some out of the ordinary cases that are remembered:

“Probably the funniest are order deadlines. When the filmmakers tell you that they want specific shields in the number of about 10 pieces and they have to be finished in two days. It really can’t be manufactured and when we try to explain, that deadline isn’t real and customers still want it, that is so funny.

We also looked for a part-time job worker for a long time and we found a 17-year-old beautiful girl in a bikini, you’d be surprised how work productivity increased along with the number of accidents”.

By the way, David and Pavel have beautiful wives and they fully share their passion for history and HMB. David’s wife Jitka Vejmělková started producing tablet weaving, which she sells at events, and Helena Kalábová paints shields.

“Our women tolerate it and go with us to events, fortunately … .. well, they MUST, –  joked David. – We rarely just sit on the event with nothing to do, we always try to do something calmly by repairing armor, weapons and shields for fighters”.

As soon as the opportunity arises, Pavel and David themselves plan to enter the lists in buhurt, because both are members of the MFC Vysočina HMB club.

We are sure that their wives will support them in this, but, probably, they will still be a little worried.

We thank David for the interview and wish these wonderful masters prosperity, new orders and, of course, success in our competitions.

In the meantime, we are preparing a new article for you about another nominees of the Artisans and Craftsmen People’s Choice Award competition, and we invite you to remember those wonderful crafters who we have already talked about earlier:

Henrikas Viteika workshop from the UK
Workshop of Anna Muzalevskaya from Russia
Historicum workshop from Poland
Past Time Pedlar workshop from the UK
Ivan Lukic, craftsman from Serbia
Patterson Shieldcraft from the UK
Racaire’s Workshop from the USA
Knight Art Workshop from France
Rogday’s Craft” Yar-Tur workshop from Ukraine

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