Art is at the core of everything Liz and Richard Hawkes do. Richard is an art conservator and Liz owns and runs the Watermark Gallery in Harrogate. They were both students at Warwick University, Richard taking Art History and Liz on the History course, when they met on a field trip to Fountain’s Abbey. During a term studying in Venice, Richard invited Liz out on a date, asking her to meet him at the Rialto bridge over the Grand Canal. They have been together ever since.
In terms of a career choice, he says conservation has seen something of resurgence with television shows such as Hidden Treasures and Behind the Scenes at the Museum. One of the more recent areas they have moved into is replicas. “Museums who want to put together an exhibition they want to stay up for maybe tow to four years – a lot of art on paper can only be shown for three to four months and so we make replicas of things – we’ve done Shakespeare’s Will and Roald Dahl’s notebooks.