FINN KOEFOED-NIELSEN has a history with trees. He grew up in made entirely of wood. After some the New Forest in a family cottage years in London spent maintaining and repairing, among other things, the Palace of Westminster and some very expensive houses, he set about creating his dream career working with wood. What's more, he was inspired to embark on this new branch of carpentry after reading an issue of COUNTRY LIFE.
I'd been looking for ages for something to do with wood that I would enjoy and that might stand a chance of paying the bills,' he admits over a mug of tea in the kitchen of his stableyard home in sleepy Chilton, Buckinghamshire.
'And then I saw the article in COUNTRY LIFE about Jim Steele, the national treasure.'
National treasure, indeed. Mr Steele made chairs for decades and his work is still sought after worldwide, even now he is retired. He enjoys keeping his eye in, mind you, and he's by no means idle: he's off to Ireland with his wife, Val, at the weekend.
Today, he is here with his protégé to talk about all things chairs-especially Windsor chairs. A sidetrack discussion begins about the minutiae of making Windsor chairs and, for a moment, the pair are lost in another world: one with its own obscure language, characters and pitfalls. They stop to draw breath and Mr Koefoed-Nielsen looks apologetic. 'We can go on like this for hours,' he laughs.
It's fair to say they are obsessed. When we repair to a nearby hostelry for lunch, they waste no time in turning every interesting chair in the saloon upside down, peering at each in minute detail. The barmaid looks on, baffled.
Denne historien er fra September 04, 2024-utgaven av Country Life UK.
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Denne historien er fra September 04, 2024-utgaven av Country Life UK.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent? Logg på
Give it some stick
Galloping through the imagination, competitive hobby-horsing is a gymnastic sport on the rise in Britain, discovers Sybilla Hart
Paper escapes
Steven King selects his best travel books of 2024
For love, not money
This year may have marked the end of brag-art’, bought merely to show off one’s wealth. It’s time for a return to looking for connoisseurship, beauty and taste
Mary I: more bruised than bloody
Cast as a sanguinary tyrant, our first Queen Regnant may not deserve her brutal reputation, believes Geoffrey Munn
A love supreme
Art brought together 19th-century Norwich couple Joseph and Emily Stannard, who shared a passion for painting, but their destiny would be dramatically different
Private views
One of the best ways-often the only way-to visit the finest privately owned gardens in the country is by joining an exclusive tour. Non Morris does exactly that
Shhhhhh...
THERE is great delight to be had poring over the front pages of COUNTRY LIFE each week, dreaming of what life would be like in a Scottish castle (so reasonably priced, but do bear in mind the midges) or a townhouse in London’s Eaton Square (worth a king’s ransom, but, oh dear, the traffic) or perhaps that cottage in the Cotswolds (if you don’t mind standing next to Hollywood A-listers in the queue at Daylesford). The estate agent’s particulars will give you details of acreage, proximity to schools and railway stations, but never—no, never—an indication of noise levels.
Mission impossible
Rubble and ruin were all that remained of the early-19th-century Villa Frere and its gardens, planted by the English diplomat John Hookham Frere, until a group of dedicated volunteers came to its rescue. Josephine Tyndale-Biscoe tells the story
When a perfect storm hits
Weather, wars, elections and financial uncertainty all conspired against high-end house sales this year, but there were still some spectacular deals
Give the dog a bone
Man's best friend still needs to eat like its Lupus forebears, believes Jonathan Self, when it's not guarding food, greeting us or destroying our upholstery, of course
