If I started calling you 'Wainwright', you might wrinkle your nose. Not because it's a weird name, but because, of course, it's not your name.
But it could have been!
There once was a time that people were named for their crafts. Not necessarily their 'jobs', mind you, though often they were the same, but things that they happened to be especially good at. So good that their name became synonymous with their skill.
You didn't need a job title – you just practised a craft until that's what people called you.
Fletcher was the guy who made arrows. Cooper was the man who made barrels. Chandler made candles, Cutler made knives, Wainwright built wagons, and Fuller thickened cloth.
Then of course you have Smith, Wheeler, Glover, Dyer, Mason, Taylor, Carpenter, Weaver, Potter, Thatcher, Miller, Baker and more.
These were a form of ancient nickname that hardened into surnames (for tax and census reasons), which turned hereditary and were passed down. All because in the mind of everyone in a village someplace, the only person you'd trust for good wood was ol' Sawyer.
Today we have some approximation of the same thing – I'm sure if you're anything like me, you could scroll through your phone book and see a decent number of listings like:
Tom Painter
Alina Cleaner
Donell Plumber
Chris Handyman
Hammed Driver
Those are all actual names saved in my phone right now. People worth remembering for a single thing they do very well.
But of course, you might be thinking, these jobs are mostly now informal and 'blue collar'.
Most of us now label each other by broader categories. Lawyer. Doctor. Consultant. 'In tech' / 'in finance'. A title that tells you almost nothing about what the person underneath it is actually good at, which is close to the opposite of what a name used to do.
This ironically brings to mind Chandler from the TV show Friends, who didn't make candles as his name might suggest, and none of his friends could remember what he did for work either.
What do they call you again?
Now that we factory-farm professions instead of developing skills via apprenticeship, it may seem like the opportunity to earn that kind of old-school specificity has passed. Not so! Your trade won't give you a name anymore, but you can always go out and get one.
My friend Garett Jones is an economist at George Mason University (inter alia), author of Hive Mind and The Culture Transplant. He once took me out for a wonderful dinner in DC with the most delicious wine. Turns out he's also a sommelier. It's something he picked up on the side, for the pleasure of it, with no connection whatsoever to his career. Ask close friends, and there's a decent chance "He's my wine guy" comes up before "He's an economist."
Another friend of mine has a PhD in molecular pharmacology. She also knits extraordinary hats and jumpers – mostly for her husband, though I have joined the queue. The two things share no domain, no skills, or professional overlap of any kind. One is a career built over a decade of research. The other is a craft she's simply chosen to get very good at.
Neither of those examples required a job change. Neither had to abandon what they already did for a living. They simply decided a second thing was worth becoming genuinely good at, and they stuck with it long enough that it's a skill I remember them for.
This works for more than just hobbies.
For good or for ill, I'm now reasonably well known among my friends as a shrewd negotiator; someone people specifically bring with them when they're haggling in a souk or negotiating a salary. People hand over to me when it's time to make a ridiculous request or deliver a great deal.
In my younger days I was also notorious enough as a tinkerer and entrepreneur. Maybe even enough to have earned the name 'Chapman' (trader or merchant).
These qualities aren't hobbies. They're not pastimes I set out to practise deliberately the way one would practise an instrument. They're things that became visible through repetition; until people started actively seeking them out.
I'm also known as someone people talk through difficult decisions with – a sounding board. It started the same way, as something people noticed in conversation until it became something I could actually be paid for by coaching executives and advising founders.
Arts vs Crafts
Do you have a name? Have you gone out of your way to get one?
I don't think it's as easy as simply having a hobby. And it's not purely a function of hours spent on something. It's actually more like what Malcolm Gladwell calls 'deliberate practice'.
Plenty of people own a toolkit and spend weekends on DIY without ever becoming the person that anyone actually calls when something needs fixing properly.
Plenty of people enjoy wine without becoming a sommelier, or even being known among friends for specifically having great taste. Owning the equipment or enjoying the activity doesn't breach the bar for earning a name.
So what's the actual dividing line between a pastime and a craft?
My best guess is that it's a function of deliberate practice. Some combination of repetition and attention; of deep focus. And then it's a question of whether enough attention and repetition have gone into it that your competence has become legible to other people. Legible enough that they'd trust you with it rather than simply knowing that you enjoy it.
Lots of people like to paint, but you might not let them paint your hallway.
We lump 'arts and crafts' together, but often they're distinct opposites.
A hobby is something you do for yourself. A craft is something other people can trust.
I daresay artists don't get paid until their art becomes a craft.
You probably still have a job title or profession. But you can decide what strangers save you as in their phones. Not by mandating it, but by earning it. Through steadfast appreciation and practice. Through pointed attention.
You can pick anything you want and become known for it. Go get yourself a name.
