The Barnsley Workshop has a unique Arts and Crafts heritage. In 1923 in rural Hampshire Edward Barnsley (1900 - 1987) established his workshop which today is lead by designer and former apprentice James Ryan (pictured above). The Barnsley Workshop maintains a direct link to the work of Edward and further back to Sidney and Ernest Barnsley, Edward’s father and uncle. They were pioneers of the Arts and Craft Movement making furniture in the Cotswolds at the end of the 19th century.

Today, as in Edward’s time, the Barnsley Workshop works to commission making beautiful individually designed and crafted pieces of furniture. 
Library Steps made in oak with walnut detailing on the treads. These elegant library steps sit on three points so they will not wobble and are almost impossible to tip over. The overall height is 148 cm. Made by Simon Owen.

2. JEREMY BROUN 
jb@woodomain.com
www.woodomain.com
01225 332738

My furniture explores materials, technique and function through simple forms. The most satisfying commissions allow me the freedom to express my own ideas. I also work to tight briefs producing pieces that, for instance, can sit comfortably in ancient 
environments such as benches for the Roman Baths in my home city and furniture for a medieval great hall for the royalty in Kent. I set up a workshop in 1973 and although self-taught as a designer, a Churchill Travel Scholarship to Sweden, Finland and Italy in 1979 was probably the single most encouraging stimulus. In that year I was elected a Fellow of the Society of Designer Craftsmen. In 2005 I won The Professional Woodworker of the Year Award for the touch screen jukebox exhibited here which was designed for my own use and love of music. Tradition without innovation is stagnant and innovation without tradition is frivolous.
Digital touchscreen jukebox designed and made by Jeremy Broun.

4. TONY PORTUS - CATO
mail@cato-design.com
www.cato-design.com
0117 929 9977

A love of classic furniture design inspired the decision to study at Parnham College, and then go on to co-found, in 1989, the Cato workshop.My early passion to bring function, proportion and beauty to my work remains with me, as I believe these qualities, realised through craft making of the highest standard, enable every piece of work to live on, transcending time and fashion. None of this, though, would be possible without wood, that extraordinary, organic material. It is my 
primary medium and its challenging qualities are what make it precious and respect-worthy, and help bring my designs to life.

The Cato Rocker designed in 1990 and handmade in small numbers ever since, each Cato Rocker is offered with an individually signed and numbered certificate, proof of its rarity and authenticity. 
Available in maple or oak. Height 100cm, width 67cm, depth 90cm 

5. DAVID COLWELL 
www.davidcolwell.co.uk

These are the most recent in a long series of batch-produced chairs. I design furniture with sustainability high on the agenda. Really good design is about visualizing a viable tomorrow. Choice of materials and production techniques is for minimum adverse and maximum positive environmental impact. From a low carbon standpoint, wood stands head and shoulders above other structural materials. Merely growing it has environmental benefits. Of the temperate hardwoods ash stands above all others for it’s toughness and, remarkably, the faster it grows the stronger it is. Ash along with the Douglas fir also absorbs more atmospheric carbons than any other timber. Oh, and it has no sapwood, so less wastage and grows well in the UK.

Steam bending is a craft where fast work is better than slow, it is very efficient and enjoyable but not fool proof, making valuable use of the craftsman’s time. It also seasons the wood whilst it’s bent, using a fraction of the energy required for kiln drying. The designs resolve themselves using triangles for strength and curves for flexibility which in turn makes the structure stronger, lighter and more comfortable. 

Maybe the most important aspects of a sustainable object is peoples’ wish to sustain it. If furniture is supremely 
comfortable and easy to live with, it stands the best chance of being sustained.

C10 Dining Chair. Batch produced in steam bent ash with pressed ash seat. Bracing and other constructional fixings in 6 mm stainless steel rod. Height 96cm, width 49cm, depth 53cm.

6. PHILIP DOBBINS
philip@dobbins.co.uk
www.dobbins.co.uk
0113 250 2738

My workshop experience has evolved from early years making exacting copies of the finest period furniture, through to the present, when I aim to be fully involved with the design and making of contemporary bespoke furniture, both to commission, and speculatively for galleries and exhibitions. 

Commission work allows me to interpret the client’s ideas at the highest level of craftsmanship. Speculative pieces allow me to develop my ideas of the continuing tradition of furniture design; informed by that tradition, rather than self-consciously innovative, I look to many periods of design for inspiration, and happily rework a concept that pleases me.

Side Table, Burr Walnut with Boxwood detail. .Height 75cm, width 73cm, depth 49cm.

7. NICHOLAS DYSON
nicholas@dysonfurniture.freeserve.co.uk
www.nicholasdyson.co.uk
01297 489 526

I trained as a furniture designer maker twenty five years ago after a career in academic publishing and have been creating commission furniture ever since, for private individuals, corporations and public institutions. My work is rooted in the history of furniture design especially English furniture of the seventeenth and nineteenth centuries. But more various and modern influences play an important and sometimes more immediately obvious role. My instinctive design practice functions most readily in response to the commissioning process – creating something new for an individual client and for a particular place.

Music stand in American black walnut and maple. Height 95cm – 139cm maximum, width 46cm, depth 39cm.

8. DEREK ELLIOTT 
derek@outofthewood.co.uk
www.outofthewood.co.uk
01451 844448

Eye and finger follow texture, line, grain, colour, space, figure, contour, fibre, tone.

The workshop is based in the heart of the Cotswolds and was set up by me in 1979. Over the years I have been offered an extraordinarily wide range of different types of woodworking projects. This has given me a strong practical and 
imaginative vocabulary. The backbone of the company is a group of able craftsmen who have shown that care and attention to detail are the prerequisites of excellence. We have not compromised on the belief that every job should be an individual response to a specific place and person. Wood is at the heart of what we do. Beautiful artefacts deserve a careful selection of the material that gives them ‘soul’. Our projects vary in size from individual pieces to schemes for whole houses.

Flower Cabinet. Semi-circular English Walnut cabinet with sycamore & ebony flowers, 218.5cm from corner to corner and 137cm high.