This is how I eventually became Paragon Kilns.

When I left university and art school, I started my own design company: interiors, graphics, photography, packaging, gardens ... I did a lot of specialist building work: from a Japanese home with sliding panels to a Thames narrow boat with an interior like a cottage.

There seemed little difference between the arts and the sciences. They were both about ideas, proportion, relationships, patterns, and increased understanding. I had brief periods of being a painter, a writer, a theatre reviewer, a photogrpher, an artist, a teacher, a musician, an arranger, and worked in other areas of creativity. West London was a liberal open lively environment so I met people at the top of their performing professions.

It soon became clear that computers were going to be part of almost every business so I started Talking Technologies, initially as a research company, looking at the relationship between humans and electronic technologies. We were one of the first companies to use the BBC B computer, and introduced programs and programming ideas to a receptive curious public.

In 1991, we created the basic concepts for a pocket PC: in many ways like a modern phone. We produced prototypes and OS software, created a user interface, and developed a set of programs. Sadly, although we had commercial interest from AEG Oympia, the LCD, memory, and processor technologies weren't ready and custom designs were far too expensive.

We were one of the first IBM VoiceType, DragonDictate, and Articulate Systems speech recognition distributors in the UK and won 1st prize at the International Innovation Show hosted by British Aerospace in 1994, demonstrating our natural language voice command grammar. We voice-enabled Reports On Call, a sophisticated clinical auditing system, for The National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery. A World first.

We created Talk Back, a new low-cost technology that gave computers a voice. The Talk Back Limited Edition was featured on 9 magazine cover CDs within the first two months and was sold in PC World. A World first. It later became the first voice synthesis product to feature British English voices.

We press-launched speech technologies at over forty national and international exhibitions, including Live, Windows, Comdex, MultiMedia, Voice, BETT, and CeBIT, and they sold in Debenhams, Leading Edge, Micro Anvika, Granada, QVC, Choice, SafeMark, PC Clinic, and other stores. It was the first software product to appear in the Innovations catalogue and the first voice recognition product to be sold in PC World and Dixons superstores, and won the PC Plus Value For Money award.

We created www.learningenglish.net to teach English, on-line: an original and comprehensive resource sold, under license, to German multinationals.

They were busy times with so much innovation. We worked from a London townhouse and had 9 employees for a while. If I had been more money-focused we could have expanded or sold the company. But having spent 5 years learning DOS, Windows, TTS, STT, Visual Basic, C++, HTML, JS, CSS, and PHP, I soon realised that I couldn't buy my life back. So I moved to a riverside apartment, unwound the company structure, and became a one-man business.

I worked with Solid Alliance in Japan, becoming the EU distributor for interesting/unusual USB products and this led to new businesses, setting up sites for pets, children's clothes, gifts, candles, art, kitchen ware, USB accessories, and design, and imported products from China, Hong Kong, Japan, the US, Pakistan, Turkey ... and I had a shop, Cherry Heaven, in Corfe castle village, Dorset.

I became a distributor for so many products, and had various brands of my own: Pretty Clothes, BusyBabies, KickStarters, i-Duck, Ghost Radar, DropBox, UFO Detector, SushiDisk, StarChild, The Working Kitchen, Luxury Candles, Chicita, Kitiki, WetPots long lasting self-watering plant pots, MagicLite, FatBear, and many others.

I expanded into jewellery and art materials. I negotiated with Art Clay Japan, and became an early UK distributor for Art Clay. I had Art Clay training with a Japanese instructor, helped set up the first Art Clay web site, and ran courses. And marketed a small kiln: the MiniKiln. But I wasn't enthused by corporate environments, adspeak, meetings, in-trays, heirarchies, the general lack of privacy, and the mis-use of customers' data. I gave away my commercial interest in Art Clay.

I've been a top-tier Paragon distributor since 2004 and www.paragonkilns.co.uk is the largest most informative kiln site outside the US. I ship kilns to any country and have supplied every size of business: Toyota downwards.

I sell all the Paragon kilns, understand the technologies, and provide comprehensive advice, competent technical support, a prompt repair workshop, and free telephone time if you have to fit parts

I'm very eco and privacy aware. Your on-line privacy is important: you won't have to create an account, register, log on, remember a password, accept cookies, or join a club. We don't harvest email addresses, and nothing is tracked, kept, re-used, or given to third parties. And no ads, fake reviews, follow-ups, newsletters, or promotions. So there's nothing to opt out of.

Paragon Kilns, Furnaces, and Ovens For Annealing, Beads, Ceramics, Enamels, Glass, Jewellery, Knife Making, Lost Wax, Silver Clays, Heat Treating, Lampwork, Porcelain, And Vitrigraph.

is a Cherry Heaven internet resource. Cherry Heaven is a top-tier international distributor for Texas-made Paragon kilns, furnaces, and ovens, and has been one of their top-selling partners from 2006 to : a pleasing outcome since the UK is only one third the area of Texas and one fortieth the area of the US.

Although Paragon kilns are very reliable, we normally have relays, thermocouples, heating muffles, programmers, and shelf kits in stock: even small parts such as screws, door hinges, bits of wire, and element connectors. Elements are the exception as there are so many variants, but these arrive air-xpress regularly.

As this is an on-line resource, there isn't a paper catalogue or a price list. However, you can mail or call about kilns, power supplies, public area safety, a special project, business ideas, diagnostics, repairs, or reselling opportunities.