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Mark Cook is the kind of guy who needs to keep his hands busy.


So between fares in Scotland's isolated Orkney Islands, the taxi driver picks up pieces of recycled ocean rope he stashes in the front seat and passes the time by continuing the ancient art of knot tying. 


Cook may live in a remote spot at the northern tip of Great Britain, but he's a part of a global movement to rid the sea of garbage and up-cycle ocean debris. 


When he finds a piece of rope washed up on the beach, he takes the tangled mess home, meticulously unsnarls it and soaks the rope and washes it — a process his wife is not so crazy about.

"At times I do push the limits when she comes home and finds the bath filled with old rope that's being washed in the bath for a day or so, to get rid of the sea smell and clean it as best I can," he said during a recent phone interview. 


He and his wife moved to the largest island in the chain that sits about six miles north of England after they visited and fell in love with the place three years ago. Cook was born in London and lived most of his life in Birmingham, an industrial town about as far from the sea as you can get in England, but now in his 50s, he said he's found his true home along the craggy coastlines of the Orkneys.


The problem was this was no easy place to make a living. So he took up taxi driving. 


And that comes with downtime. Sometimes, a lot of downtime.  


"I don't like to just sit and do nothing when I'm in the taxi waiting for my next hire. I've always got a small piece of rope there, and I'm making something or other," he said. "I like bringing things back together and doing things with my hands."


Cook discovered piles of tangled up old rope washed ashore while walking the vast beaches of his new home with his dog. Wanting to create something with the rope, Cook bought knot books, including 

 which Cook calls "Every knot-tiers bible."


The book was written by Clifford W. Ashley, a sailor and author of various seafaring books. Ashley spent 40 years learning about tying knots, which have names as poetic as their graceful turns, names like "chain stitch," "clove hitch," "butterfly bend," "dogshank, "Turk's-head," "jug sling" and "the grief knot."


"Rope and cordage in those days was such an important tool for them, that they wouldn't just abandon and leave it and not have another use for it, I think they would be appalled if they saw all this stuff being wasted and not being used," Cook said.


After the painstaking cleaning and drying process, Cook takes the ropes to his workbench and starts weaving it together, using ancient maritime knots and ultimately creating gorgeous thump mats worthy of hanging on a museum wall.


"With the piece of rope, depending on the size of it, the thickness of it, and its condition, how worn and weathered it is, I decide what I'm going to make with it," he said. "The longer the rope, the more choices I have what I can do with it. With the longer pieces I normally start with making a mat, the Kringle mat, the thump mat, there's an ocean plait and an oblong mat."

 or visit his Facebook page to see videos of Cook tying rope mats and creating other creations from recycled rope at 

Gallery

Arts and Culture

Heather McElhatton

Author

A taxi driver has turned to the ancient art of knot tying on a remote island off the north coast of Great Britain. He's part of a global movement to rid the sea of garbage by recycling ocean debris.

Taxi driver is cleaning the sea one knot at a time

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