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woodworking school UK

Making success happen

Anselm Fraser, principal, writing in The Woodworker magazine

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Courses for everyone

A week-long woodworking course doesn’t seem long enough to learn very much.

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Spalted console

A simple fact about bespoke furniture is that good design sells.

That’s a lesson that Fiona Gilfillan, one of recent professional course graduates has learned.

During her course, she made a spalted Sycamore and Elm console table, which sold at the graduate exhibition.

She was then commissioned by another customer to make a second console table.

Now she’s just completing a third, making her something of a console queen.

Fiona was the second student on our newly-introduced month-long intermediate course last year.

FeeMade

Then, despite not initially intending to make woodworking her life, she enrolled on our 2018/19 professional course.

Fiona is now setting up FeeMade from incubation space at the school.

Those spaces, Myreside Studios, are one of the ways we try to help graduates in their early careers.

Because we don’t believe that education and support should end when our students graduate.

Instead, in a more holistic approach, our Myreside Studios allow graduates to set themselves up in business from the school’s campus.

We give them good working space and full access to equipment and machinery.

They also have continued help from our tutors, so that they don’t have to feel isolated.

Myreside Studios

That’s important because our students build up close working relationships with other students, with everyone learning from each other.

Myreside Studios allow those working relationships to extend into professional life so that, in a very real sense, the school is a community of students and professional woodworkers.

Fiona also has one other claim to Chippendale woodworking fame.

She first came to us on a one-week introductory course, making her the only person to have completed all three of our courses.

Fiona is gifted and hard-working and we’re hugely pleased that she’s staying on at the school.

Note: Two places still remain for our professional course that starts next month.  More information here or contact us here.

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Brexit divides cabinet

Stephen Barr, one of our recent professional course graduates, first came to the school on a one-week introductory course.

It’s a good way for potential professional woodworkers to see if they really do have sawdust in their veins.

And if they do, and enrol onto our professional course, the introductory course fees are deducted.

It’s a route into woodworking that several professional course students have taken, having proved to themselves that woodworking is the career for them.

For Stephen, originally from Northern Ireland but now living in Edinburgh, it was a bold change of professional direction.

His previous career was in IT consultancy, with his own company, which he sold.

Stephen Barr Brexit Chippendale furniture school

Stephen’s stand-out piece, for which he won this year’s Richard Demarco Prize, was a humorous statement on the vexed question of Brexit.

His “Strong and Stable Brexit Cabinet” was just as divided as the country on the issue.

EU stars

His two-door cabinet in Walnut and Japanese Ash depicted the Union Jack on one door, and the EU’s stars on the other.

Also, one of the EU’s stars was missing…a visual quip about the UK’s intention to (maybe) leave the EU.

In our experience, furniture sells when it’s well-made and carries a design that turns it into a talking point.

Not only was Stephen’s cabinet extremely well made but his fun design gave it topical appeal.

In the run-up to the school’s graduation exhibition, several newspapers – including The Times – carried stories about his cabinet.

At the exhibition itself he was awarded The Richard Demarco Prize 2019.

Demarco

This annual prize is awarded by Professor Richard Demarco CBE, one of the UK’s leading arts commentators.

Professor Demarco’s prize is awarded to the student whose work not only displays design and woodworking skill but exceptional artistic talent.

Stephen is now setting up Starship Unicorn Furniture from incubation space at the school.

These spaces, Myreside Studios, are another good reason to study at the Chippendale school.

They allow graduates to immediately set up in business and make full use of the school’s equipment and machinery.

They also still have tutor support in case of difficulty in those important early months.

It’s all part of the school’s holistic approach to teaching woodworking and helping our students post-graduation.

Note: Two places still remain unfilled on our professional course 2019/20, which starts next month.  More information here or contact us here.

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Gordon’s Twin Tree

We’re often asked how we can turn novices into professional woodworkers in only 30 weeks.

The answer is that we have the very best teaching methods and staff.

Our professional course has been running for well over thirty years.

So, we have learned what works to ensure that our graduates have all the skills they need.

Compare that to a four-year university course, with all the student debt that involves.

One successful student, who demonstrated talent in spades, was Gordon Young from Edinburgh.

Gordon began on the ‘conventional’ route, earning a Masters degree in civil engineering from Heriot-Watt University.

Design

It’s a qualification that has some relevance to fine furniture making because it does involve an understanding of how to design things.

Gordon Young Chippendale furniture school

Other students often don’t have design skills when they come to us, which is why it’s the first thing we teach our students.

After all, if you can’t visualise a design in 3D you can’t easily make fine furniture.

Not only that, but we also bring in Isa Dorster who teaches at the lycée des métiers d’art georges guynemer near Montpellier.

She is a renowned expert in the subtle art of teaching 3D visualisation.  Isa augments our own tutors who can also teach computer aided design.

Gordon therefore had a head start on some of our students, design-wise.  But he’s also someone who has always been a natural at making things.

He proved that with his beautiful and functional desk in Oak and flamed Beech.

Gordon Young desk Chippendale school

It was sinuous and tactile but, a cardinal element for every piece of furniture, utterly practical.

Its design was made special by Gordon fashioning the two contrasting woods to converge on the top.

He joined them together with a seam of macassar ebony veneer, with the seam then falling down the side of the desk.

Gilding

Gordon also demonstrated a real talent for gilding on the course, particularly his parquetry chess board framed in oak.

Gordon gilded his chess board frame with copper, then treated it with alcohol to create an aged effect.

This was then sprayed with copper nitrate acid to turn Verdigris, which describes the resulting green pigment.

Gordon is setting up Twin Tree Design, and intends to pursue a career in general bespoke fine furniture.

We’re delighted that he has chosen to stay on at the Chippendale school and work from our on-campus incubation space, Myreside Studios.

This allows our professional course graduates to immediately get started in their new careers.  Importantly, they still have access to the school’s equipment, machinery and tutor support.

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Form and function

Our students at the Chippendale school become good woodworkers by learning the rules of good furniture design.

However, we also encourage them to then tear up the rule book.

Because great furniture design can also be about incorporating the right level of quirky surprise.

It’s about making something that is entirely functional, and then adding a dollop of creativity.

That’s what Matthew McGlone achieved with his Elm and stained Oak side table.

Matthew, originally from Manchester but long-time resident of Scotland, completed it after “three weeks of manic work.”

Professional course

In the first part of our professional course we teach students how to make basic things like doors and table legs and the jointing techniques to hold everything together.

In other words, our students learn how things should be made.

Matthew McGlone at bench Chippendale

Later in the course, once our students have gained proficiency and confidence, they can then decide if the rule book can be thrown out the window.

That’s the part of the course when a little bit of magic can happen.  The latter part of the course is when our students have the skills and confidence to unleash their imaginations.

Instead of his side table having “proper” doors, Matthew incorporated sinuous and dramatic gaps into his design.

In an otherwise functional piece, it lends originality – and buyers of fine furniture appreciate originality.

Form and function

But that balance of form and function is important, because any piece of furniture must perform the tasks it is designed for.

If it doesn’t – for example, if a cupboard is difficult to access or a chair is uncomfortable – then that balance is disrupted.

But, as far as Matthew was concerned, who says that side table doors should be solid?  And his pieces do exactly what they were designed for.

It was a bold and imaginative design approach which we applaud.  Matthew also incorporated those dramatic gaps in an earlier table.

That confidence in his trade possibly reflects his long-term fascination with wood.

In his childhood, he spent hours bush-crafting in woods, fashioning spoons from small pieces of wood.

Myreside Studios

But he’s also a wordsmith, with a degree in English Literature and a Masters in Creative Writing.

The word’s out that he’s setting up his business, Wild Wood Furniture, from incubation space at the school.

These workshop spaces, Myreside Studios, allow graduates to start up for themselves, with full access to the school’s equipment and machinery.

It’s all part of the holistic approach we take at the Chippendale school – giving an all-round professional course, but with real support after graduation.

The good news is that Matthew has already won commissions and is hard at work!

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Chippendale International School of Furniture
Gifford
East Lothian
EH41 4JA near Edinburgh
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