We recently had the chance to connect with Matt Campbell and have shared our conversation below.
Good morning Matt, we’re so happy to have you here with us and we’d love to explore your story and how you think about life and legacy and so much more. So let’s start with a question we often ask: What do the first 90 minutes of your day look like?
I’m definitely a coffee person—without question. Most days, I’m on the two-to-five–cup program, and those first two cups are an essential part of my morning ritual. While I ease into the day with cups one and two, I make my task list, set my priorities, and map out what the day will look like.
Once I’m settled, I move through the essentials—checking emails and taking care of the small, routine tasks that keep everything running smoothly. But I always make room for the things that genuinely inspire me, especially fly tying. Keeping that creative window open each day helps me stay connected to the craft and reminds me why I love doing what I do.
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
My brand is a living collection of every fly pattern I’ve tied—and every one I’ll tie—for as long as I’m gifted time on this planet. It’s truly my life’s work. I tie, test, refine, and teach from this foundation. On my website, I showcase fly-tying recipes straight from my personal fly box, and I’m continually adding step-by-step guides and video lessons to support tyers and fly anglers of all experience levels. My blog and YouTube channel follow my journey at the vise and on the water, sharing tying tips, fishing insights, and the latest creations as they come to life. This brand is my dedication to a sport that has shaped me for half a lifetime. To me, nothing compares to the feeling of catching a fish on a fly you created—whether it’s simple or complex, it’s the pure thrill of creative success.
Right now, I’m working on a fly-tying book centered on one of my main passions: carp fly fishing. The book will feature three original patterns with step-by-step photographic tying guides, complete recipes, and a bonus pattern to help new tyers and anglers get started in the world of carp flies. It’s only the beginning, and I’m excited to bring this project to completion for the carp fly fishing community. Carp have always been one of my favorite gamefish—I was chasing them long before they were “cool,” back when the purists turned their noses up. That makes this project even more meaningful to me.
Thanks for sharing that. Would love to go back in time and hear about how your past might have impacted who you are today. Who were you before the world told you who you had to be?
I was a man on the water. Testing flies, refining techniques, letting my creative mind work instead of becoming what others said I should be. I spent countless hours at the vise and on the river, getting flies to swim right and learning the rhythms of seasonal feeding. That was my drive—my pulse.
But as life got heavier and more complicated, I drifted from that passion. I thought I needed to be something. So I walked away from the water and built a cookie-cutter life. For a while, I believed I needed the titles, the degrees, the perfect lawn—the proof that I did things just like everyone else.
It wasn’t me.
I almost earned two master’s degrees, and they’re barely worth the paper they’d be printed on. We’re all created with a purpose, and mine is to spark creativity in others at the vise and push forward a sport locked in tradition.
I had it right the first time, and now I’m returning to my roots.
I won’t leave the water again.
This time, it’s for keeps.
Is there something you miss that no one else knows about?
I miss those late evenings that bled into night on my home creek, casting for smallmouth. You can barely see a thing, but you can hear the fish feeding—violent splashes in the dark. It’s blind instinct at that hour, relying on nothing but feel or sound.
Some of my most unforgettable fish came in those moments. I was young then, and I didn’t have the camera gear to capture any of it the way it deserved. No high-quality photos, no videos—just memory. Now it’s the daydreams that remind me how good I had it.
So a lot of these questions go deep, but if you are open to it, we’ve got a few more questions that we’d love to get your take on. What would your closest friends say really matters to you?
My closest friends already know the truth: I’ve lived and breathed fly fishing, tying flies like it was my full-time job—because at times, it was. I’ve spent years chasing a deeper understanding on the water, letting rivers teach me what the world couldn’t.
But beyond the vise and the cast, what really matters are people—real people. The kind whose honesty hits harder than any current, whose presence feels like home. Being true in all things is the only compass I trust.
The ones in my life who live by that same code have become more than fishing partners. They’re family—the kind that sticks through thick, thin, and everything the river drags between. Anyone who truly knows me wouldn’t argue it. I don’t carry a fake bone in my body, and only those wired the same way ever stay.
They’re the only ones who understand my passion for what it really is. A way of life and a calling.
Okay, we’ve made it essentially to the end. One last question before you go. When do you feel most at peace?
I feel most at peace the moment I step into a creek and the outside world finally falls away. It’s like slipping into a trance—where the noise, the stress, the endless grind of a broken world just dissolves. Something else switches on in my mind, something primitive but sharper, and suddenly the only thing that exists is the flow of the water and the quiet intention of bringing a fish to the net.
I move upstream toward the untouched bends and riffles where I know no one goes—just me, God, and the wild things that claim that creek as home. Out there, wrapped in water and quiet, I find a kind of peace nothing else can touch. There isn’t much on this earth that settles me more than that.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://tfgflies.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theflyguyfishing/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/theflyguytfgflies
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/tfgflies
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@theflyguytfgflies
- Other: Learn With The Fly Guy-https://theflyguy-tfgflies.setmore.com/beta
Image Credits
Matt Campbell
