Melinda Schwakhofer, who graduated from The Chippendale International School of Furniture in 1999, built this bed as her final project on the furniture design, furniture making and furniture restoration course.
Melinda, who is now a fibre artist, created the headboard art quilt at the same time as the bed, which she calls ‘Enter the Forest of Dreams’. The bed quilt was created in 2012.
Dr Lucy Worsley meets Anselm Fraser and learns how to make a Thomas Chippendale chair leg at the Chippendale International School of Furniture.
She describes the great craftsman’s famous Director as “like an Ikea catalogue” and sees a Chippendale chair worth a £1 million.
At the Furniture School, historian Dr Lucy Worsley has a shot at making a Chippendale chair leg in the School’s workshop using traditional methods with a little help from Anselm’s guidance.
An interview with Eilidh Keith, glass artist, a visiting specialist in stained glass
Eilidh Keith is the Chippendale International School of Furniture’s visiting ‘glass artist’, and spends a week each year during the third term teaching the furniture school students how to work with stained glass. Eilidh is one of the distinguished visiting experts who make invaluable contributions to enriching the woodworking courses. Her impressive business and teaching career extends to more than 20 years.
Award winning Anselm Fraser Furniture, which runs alongside the Chippendale International School of Furniture, completed a bespoke kitchen installation for a client just in time for Christmas. The furniture design and furniture restoration business has created and installed more than 80 bespoke kitchens over the years.
However, this installation was different…
UK service men and women from the Army, Navy and RAF may now qualify for a grant of £1,000 to £2,000 towards their Chippendale International School of Furniture fees, because the Furniture School is now an Approved Learning Provider under the MOD’s Enhanced Learning Credit (ELC) Scheme.
“I’m looking forward to inviting more retired or redundant members of the Armed Forces onto our 9 month furniture making course,” says Anselm Fraser, the Furniture School Principal.
Chippendale School of Furniture’s Anselm Fraser fuses big sky thinking with commercial savvy
Main part of a feature published in Good Woodworking in Growth Rings in October 2011. Reproduced with thanks. Words: Darren Loucaides. Photos: Dave Roberts.
As mist settles on the hills surrounding this secluded spot in Gifford, 25 miles east of Edinburgh, it feels like we’ve happened upon a deserted country house. Chippendale International School of Furniture is out for summer, and stalking around its exhibition hall, quiet but for our footfall thundering across the rugged floorboards, the atmosphere is eerie. Perhaps we’re hearing distant echoes, glimpses of movement just beyond our vision – hints of the life that usually fills the place.
