General

Plain sailing for boating baby

When Sam Rouse found out that his wife Kayla was expecting a baby, he did what any father would do – he built a wooden crib in the shape of a boat.

Sam (24) is an American student at the Chippendale International School of Furniture in East Lothian and is originally from North Carolina.

He met his wife at university in Virginia, where he was studying business marketing and she was studying nursing.  From when they were married, the couple had planned to move to Scotland to allow Sam to pursue his life-long passion for woodworking.

When they finally achieved their family goal of enrolling Sam into the Chippendale  school, it was only natural that Sam’s first furniture project be for the newest member of his family.

Sam completed the crib, inspired from his own childhood spending summer holidays on the North Carolina coast, just in time for Liliana’s birth in April.

The crib is made from ash, elm and fumed oak with cherry and walnut accents and has an anchor-shaped floor stand.  Its side planks were hand planed and each detail meticulously crafted.

The Chippendale International School of Furniture takes students from all over the world for its immersive 30-week course.  This year, the school’s students come from the USA, Canada, the UK, Ireland, France, Germany, Russia, Australia and New Zealand.

“Not every baby gets a custom-made boat for a bed,” says Sam. “I hope that Liliana will one day have children of her own, and that her crib will become a family heirloom.”

Sam plans to return to the States this June and start a furniture design business of his own. His desire is to help others create heirloom quality pieces of furniture that will be as unique as the people they are made for.

“There is something truly special about having a piece of furniture in your home that was made specifically for you – quality furniture that not only looks beautiful but is sturdy enough to stand the test of time,” says Sam.

“I believe that there are many people who are looking for just that and I plan to help them create inspiring pieces of furniture that will truly be enjoyed and handed down the generations!”

To find out more, visit www.samrousefurniture.com or email Sam at info@samrousefurniture.com.

Getting creative in real world furniture design

In the second of three articles on modern woodworking, Anselm Fraser, principal of the Chippendale International School of Furniture, looks at changing patterns of living, and how our smaller homes are influencing furniture design. 

Every woodworker that passes through the Chippendale International School of Furniture is taught that good design is either about beautiful creativity or wonderful practicality – and preferably both.

However, in my experience, modern woodworkers all too often fall into the trap of believing their craft should be based solely on their creativity – and creating fabulous pieces of furniture that have little relevance to the real world.  My view on creativity is more complex.

So, first, let’s have a look at the real world because it’s the place that we inhabit, and it’s because it’s full of people who need a bed to sleep in, a table to sit at, and a chair to lounge on.  A world full of people who need furniture.

But, according to the UN, more than half of the world’s population now lives in urban areas and, by 2050, about 70% of the world’s population is expected to live in towns and cities.

The current level of urbanisation ranges from 82% of the population in North America to 40% in Africa, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit, in their Safe Cities Index 2015.

Every day, over 187,000 people become city dwellers.   In 1950, New York was the world’s first megacity, defined as having a population of more than 10 million people.

Now there are more than 20 megacities and, by 2025, New York is likely to have dropped to sixth on the list – behind Tokyo, Delhi, Shanghai, Mumbai, and Mexico City.

All that urban living has enormous implications not only for infrastructure but for the size of homes that we live in.  For example, in 1920, average homes in the UK measured about 1,647 square feet.  Now they measure 925 square feet, according to the Institution of British Architects.

Research has also found that the average one bedroom flat is now the same size as a London Underground tube carriage.

Which (finally) brings me to my point: a UK 2012 report found “long- and short-term storage space” – for everyday stuff such as ironing boards and bed linen was one of the features people most wanted in their home.

As furniture designers, we have to recognise how our markets have changed and make furniture that is fit for purpose for the 21^st century – markets that involve real people living in smaller spaces, but wanting creative solutions for their everyday needs.

Of course, there will always be a large market for those able to live in larger accommodation, but furniture design constantly needs to evolve to remain relevant – and creatively anticipating and meeting modern trends is a skill that woodworkers must acquire.

So, why not have a look around your home?  What about those stairs that do nothing more than allow you access to the upper floor?  Why couldn’t some, or all, of those stairs also be drawers for storage?

Or the coffee table cluttering up your living room?  Why can’t it also have storage space for books or clutter?  In other words, small spaces need furniture that is multi-functional.  Sofas than turn into bunk beds, tables and chairs that are also book shelves…the list goes on and on.

For me, good furniture design must fulfil a clear need, but do it beautifully.  Form and function should seamlessly work together to create furniture that looks good, works well, and is practical.

For example, last year we had a student whose big idea was to make fabulous bespoke furniture that could be easily dismantled.  She had rightly identified that over 50% of people aged under 25 have already lived in three or more homes.  On average, they’ll typically move three more times before they are 45 – and moving large pieces of furniture can be a hassle.

Too many furniture designers are still wedded to creativity making something for generous spaces: the large dining table or sideboard, for example.  These commissions, they reason, will generate a large sum of money and make their designs worthwhile.

For some, that may well be right.  But in my experience, older people who have moved up the property ladder to large properties generally have the signature or bespoke furniture they want – some, perhaps, inherited.  They might have the space, but not necessarily the need.

Also, older people often like old things.  They represent a collective market that browses in antique shops, and who wouldn’t necessarily think about commissioning a new piece of furniture.

But what about younger buyers, living in small spaces, and needing creative multi-purpose furniture solutions?  The maths is compelling, certainly for those in affluent areas.

The average UK salary is currently about £27,500.  In the City of London it’s close to £50,000, roughly double the UK median.  Other UK cities have the same disparity, if not on the scale of London.  That means that an average couple living together in wealthy inner-city areas are likely to be cash rich but property poor.

In other words, it suggests that woodworkers should be looking again who their customers are – or who their customers could be, and challenging their creativity to offer furniture solutions rather than just furniture.

In that sense, creativity should be more than just designing and making a beautiful piece of furniture.  Creativity should also be about identifying buying markets and designing for them – real people in the real world, with very real needs and expectations.

In his final article in the series, Anselm Fraser will address the perennial bugbear of how to price bespoke furniture.

Chippendale School wins Global Business Excellence Award

We are absolutely delighted to announce that The Chippendale International School of Furniture has been named WINNER of the Outstanding Educational Service category at the 2015 Global Business Excellence Awards.

The Global Business Excellence Awards pride themselves on having a large panel of independent expert judges who select winners according to strict criteria for each category and sector, focusing on financial results, innovation, customer, employee, investor and community benefits.

Commenting on the Chippendale International School of Furniture, the Chairman of the judges said: “Congratulations to the Chippendale International School of Furniture for putting British education in furniture design on the international map.

“The school runs intensive 30-week courses and by combining its own in-house expert tutors with a rota of visiting experts, it offers training in old techniques and those using the latest technology.  It has a reputation as a beacon of excellence, attracting pupils from all around the world and it is showcasing the UK as the place to go for expert training in furniture making.”

Anselm Fraser, Principal of the School, said: “We are absolutely delighted to have won this prestigious award, which again underlines our status as an internationally-recognised furniture school – a school that continues to attract students from around the world.

“Furniture design and making is an age-old craft that also uses modern techniques and computer technologies – a something-old and something-new teaching course.  We’re very pleased to have been recognised as an international place of learning in a niche area of education”, he said.

Furniture Restoration Skills For Life

Simon McIntyre, a furniture restoration expert and owner of Downland Restoration in West Sussex, spent last week with our students introducing them to the fine art of furniture restoration.

A wide selection of items were worked on, from a wooden frame for a dinner-gong

Dinner Gong Frame

Gong stand restored

to a revolving bookcase, drop-leaf tables and a varied selection of chairs.

Revolving Bookcase damaged

Revolving Bookcase Restored

Broken Chair Back Strut

Gosford Chair Frame Restored

A magnificent, large carved buffalo, damaged in transit from overseas, was also among the items to be repaired, filled, waxed and polished.

Buffalo patiently awaits restoration

Restored – and ‘Buffed’

Our students will continue to work on various projects as they progress through their nine-month course, with some of them hoping to specialize in the fine art of furniture restoration.

Furniture design, renaissance and reality

In the first of a series of articles on modern woodworking, Anselm Fraser, principal of the Chippendale International School of Furniture, looks at the 20^th century greats, and offers an upbeat assessment for woodworking in the years ahead. 

As a furniture design school, our primary focus is to teach woodworking.  It’s that fundamental skill that our students can take into their creative and business lives – to design and make beautiful furniture.

But what is beautiful furniture? – and how can you teach someone to be creative?  After all, to succeed in furniture design requires skills and talents that few of us possess.

The trick, I believe, is to go back to basics and first understand why some furniture designs have withstood the test of time, and why others have entirely faded from memory.

Until the start of the 20^th century, all furniture was made from wood.  It was the only available building material – cheap, plentiful and easy to work with.

But wood carried with it one important drawback – production of chairs, tables and beds was limited by the number of craftsmen and women able to fashion a tree into a functional piece of furniture.  That made good furniture very expensive.

The Industrial Revolution that had transformed virtually every aspect of manufacturing had entirely bypassed furniture design – the intricate tasks involved in transforming wood into furniture were incapable of being mechanised.

All that changed in the first decades of the 20^th century as furniture designers realised that they no longer needed to work with wood – other materials would do just as well, if not better.

It paved the way for mass production, using steel, glass or plastic – and making furniture affordable for everyone.  Modernism was born.

Some of those Modernist designs are still classics, while designers such as Walter Gropius, Josef Albers and Charles and Ray Eames remain influential designers for today’s furniture designers.

It’s no coincidence that the likes of Le Corbusier and Mies van der Rohe were also architects, able to balance form and function across disciplines, or Isamu Noguchi, whose classic designs were inspired by his other life as a sculptor.

Their creativity was to move away from wood and to use whatever material best suited their imaginations, or their one blinding flash of brilliance.

For example, Marcel Breuer’s chromium-plated steel Wassily chair was inspired by his bicycle.  If a bicycle’s handlebars could be made from tubular steel, he thought to himself, why not a chair?

Of course, wood never went out of fashion.  It was simply complemented by other materials to make Modernist furniture stackable or practical or affordable.  For example, Sam Maloof, the iconic mid-20^th century furniture designer, always described himself as being, first and foremost, a woodworker.

His rocking chairs, owned by US presidents and museums, have become collectors’ items for the very rich.  One recently sold at auction in Los Angeles for over $80,000 – not bad for a walnut and ebony chair only made in 1986.

The fact is that wood furniture has never gone out of fashion, and my guess is that it’s now gaining in popularity.  In the UK, TV advertisements for home furniture have begun to extol the virtues of tables, beds and cabinets made from solid wood.

In an ubiquitous world of cheap MDF and plywood, good old-fashioned wood is being seen again as a material of quality and durability – a simple recognition that, while it may be a bit more expensive, you’re buying something that will last a lifetime.

There’s a bit of psychology involved.  Until recently, most of the furniture that we bought came with an unspoken date for its obsolescence.  When we changed home, or simply redecorated, we bought new furniture.  In the scheme of things, it wasn’t a huge cost – and, anyway, the old stuff was looking a bit tatty.

Now, perhaps after the financial crash, we’ve maybe come to reassess that mindset, because a finely-crafted table, chair, bed or cabinet isn’t simply a fashion statement – it’s something to be treasured over the lifetime, and across generations.

It’s also maybe no coincidence that TV programmes about antiques have become so popular, and not just because we secretly hope that the dreadful painting that Aunt Meg left us is actually a priceless Picasso.

Fact is, we are learning again to treasure the past.  And not just the antique things that were made in the past.  We are treasuring again the skills and materials from which the past was made – and wanting those things to be recreated today.

That’s why I think that furniture design could be on the brink of a renaissance.  Wood is once again being seen as a material to be valued, and furniture no longer unwanted clutter to be chucked away when we paint the living room walls.

In that space between yesterday and today is a huge opportunity for today’s woodworkers and furniture designers: to create pieces that are timeless, able to fit seamlessly into people’s homes – becoming things that will be cherished and passed on to children and grandchildren.

That just leaves the thorny question of creativity, and how to design the next great thing – even if you’re not particularly creative.  Oh, and one other small issue: how to price your creation so that people will actually want to buy it.

Those, however, are questions for future articles.