The eyes of the England and Wales’ stonemasonry industries will be focused firmly on City of Bath College on Wednesday (18th May) when the College hosts the UK Skills Stonemasonry competition.

The contest, which is organised by the Stone Federation of Great Britain, will see teams of skilled stonemasonry students from Colleges throughout the country go head to head to determine which learners are the best in the business.

The UK Skills competition, which will be staged at the College’s state-of-the-art Construction Skills Centre, will also see the best individual students entered into the national finals of the prestigious SkillBuild competition, which takes place in Leeds in September.

The UK Skills competition will see all students given a drawing for a job. They will then have to work a piece of stone to create a design in line with the set specification.

The students representing City of Bath College in the competition are David Bean, Theo St Leger King and Rob Tinsley.

Other Colleges taking part in the competition are York College, Moulton College, Weymouth College, Coleg Menai in Anglesey and The Building Crafts College, London.

As well as staging the competition, City of Bath College will also host the annual meeting of the Stone Federation of Great Britain, which brings together colleges and industry representatives from around the country.

Ray Sumner, Stonemasonry lecturer, said: “Hosting such a high-profile competition reflects very well on City of Bath College, the courses we run and our excellent facilities for trainee stonemasons.

“The College prides itself on its excellent links with leading businesses and its industry-relevant course content and our students consistently find work with leading companies.

“The UK Skills competition is always a tough challenge, but I’m confident our students will do us proud.”