IN a larch-boarded studio warmed by burning sawdust, a specialist in cutting-edge medical technology is whittling away at a piece of walnut with a small hook knife. The retired NHS professional dreams of making a writing desk, but, for now, he's set on carving wooden spoons and has enrolled on a two-day workshop with visiting tutor Louise Forbes.
It's the weekend and many full-time students have decamped to Northumberland for a murder-mystery house party, but there's still a buzz of activity at the Chippendale International School of Furniture. As Rob from Ottawa in Canada-ex-military, carpenter, arborealist-Eileen, a local teacher, and Pippa, an Edinburgh-based influencer, chip away at their spoons, a few students on the intensive Professional Course are putting in some quiet hours in the main workshop. The atmosphere, despite the intermittent screech of a bandsaw, is surprisingly therapeutic. Projects in progress furnish orderly workbenches: a latticed coffee table, a steam-bent toboggan, an oak settle with inlaid copper leaves.
As his dog snoozes beside his tool trolley, Barney Hagger absorbs himself in the new carcass he's making for a 1967 HMV radiogram he inherited from his grandfather. The carpenter from Leighton Buzzard in Bedfordshire plans to set up as an independent designer maker and is here to acquire the experience and professional qualification. He credits his girlfriend for supporting him financially and keeping their house going as he lives in a caravan beside the school. 'Every morning, I walk through the woods, take off my wellies and step into the studio. It's the coolest place,' he enthuses. 'Everybody's supercreative and we all engage with each other and share banter and terminology.'
This story is from the {{IssueName}} edition of {{MagazineName}}.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the {{IssueName}} edition of {{MagazineName}}.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
Save our family farms
IT Tremains to be seen whether the Government will listen to the more than 20,000 farming people who thronged Whitehall in central London on November 19 to protest against changes to inheritance tax that could destroy countless family farms, but the impact of the good-hearted, sombre crowds was immediate and positive.
A very good dog
THE Spanish Pointer (1766–68) by Stubbs, a landmark painting in that it is the artist’s first depiction of a dog, has only been exhibited once in the 250 years since it was painted.
The great astral sneeze
Aurora Borealis, linked to celestial reindeer, firefoxes and assassinations, is one of Nature's most mesmerising, if fickle displays and has made headlines this year. Harry Pearson finds out why
'What a good boy am I'
We think of them as the stuff of childhood, but nursery rhymes such as Little Jack Horner tell tales of decidedly adult carryings-on, discovers Ian Morton
Forever a chorister
The music-and way of living-of the cabaret performer Kit Hesketh-Harvey was rooted in his upbringing as a cathedral chorister, as his sister, Sarah Sands, discovered after his death
Best of British
In this collection of short (5,000-6,000-word) pen portraits, writes the author, 'I wanted to present a number of \"Great British Commanders\" as individuals; not because I am a devotee of the \"great man, or woman, school of history\", but simply because the task is interesting.' It is, and so are Michael Clarke's choices.
Old habits die hard
Once an antique dealer, always an antique dealer, even well into retirement age, as a crop of interesting sales past and future proves
It takes the biscuit
Biscuit tins, with their whimsical shapes and delightful motifs, spark nostalgic memories of grandmother's sweet tea, but they are a remarkably recent invention. Matthew Dennison pays tribute to the ingenious Victorians who devised them
It's always darkest before the dawn
After witnessing a particularly lacklustre and insipid dawn on a leaden November day, John Lewis-Stempel takes solace in the fleeting appearance of a rare black fox and a kestrel in hot pursuit of a pipistrelle bat
Tarrying in the mulberry shade
On a visit to the Gainsborough Museum in Sudbury, Suffolk, in August, I lost my husband for half an hour and began to get nervous. Fortunately, an attendant had spotted him vanishing under the cloak of the old mulberry tree in the garden.