The Longbow Shop Blog — English Longbows

Robert Hardy visited the Longbow Shop on May 2015 which is a date everyone will remember for a very long time to come and a high point for the UK's largest traditional archery shop based in Birkenhead. The Longbow Shop had the privilege of hosting a day with the legendary actor, author and longbow expert Robert Hardy CBE who enthralled over 100 guests, sharing his amazing experiences and knowledge about longbows and the famous battles they were used in while keeping the enthusiastic crowd of people (archers and non-archers alike) spellbound and hanging on every word. Mr Hardy gave insights...

Horn reinforced self nock arrows are pretty easy to make yourself. With a couple of simple items great looking horn self nock arrows can be easily made: 3 Hack Saw blades Sanding paper Wire wool Pencil nock strips With a steady hand it's really easy to do yourself. Reinforcing an arrow stops the shaft from splitting on release of the string. This is really important especially if shooting very heavy bows. Here's a little infographic I put together a few years ago to show how easy it is to make these reinforced arrows. Hope you like it! You can buy the required arrow strips for...

Since winning Theo Paphitis #SBS Twitter award we've been even busier than usual and the PR machine has certainly been rolling. So far we've been involved with supplying TV for The White Queen, Dr Who (Robots of Sherwood) and new series The Royals made in the US featuring our own Liz Hurley and we were even approached by a production company to supply a bow for an Ed Sheeran music vid! We've had peak airtime on BBC Radio 2 drive time slot plus local radio interviews. On top of our normal retail business we've also managed to launch our new...

When Jason asked me if I fancied coming up with some hints and tips with a coaching element, I thought “this could be interesting! Would you coach traditional archery any differently from recurve or compound archery? What are the differences? What are the similarities?” In the end I thought I would start with the basics. I have spent a lot of time over the last few years watching competent longbow and traditional archers shooting both target and field. I have also spent quite a lot of time talking to them. One thing I have noticed is that there can be...

Ever wondered how to get a taper fit arrow point to sit flush with the arrow shaft? It's something so easy yet very few archers know how to do it and we all know there's something not quite right about the shoulder of the point sitting proud on the shaft.Here's the tip. Cut your tapers on the shaft as normal. Get yourself a small butane torch (about £5 on fleabay) and a pair of pliers. Heat the point up while being held in the pliers and force the hot point on to your tapered shaft. The heat makes a slight...