Birchill set up a workspace in his backyard and started carving figures, chiefly animals, out of stone. All of his work is created by hand—that is, he carves only with a hammer and various chisels. He believes that most work done with power tools looks as if the tools controlled the artist and not the other way around. To an unusual degree, the stone itself determines what he as an artist does with it. This was his first museum exhibition.