the contemporary craft fair

we are busy making work for our next show, The Contemporary Craft Fair at Bovey Tracey. It's on from this friday 5th to sunday 7th of june and showcases 165 of the uk's best designer makers of ceramics, jewellery, furniture, textiles, mixed media, fashion, silver, leather, metal & much more.


as well as being able to buy direct from the makers at the show there will also be workshops & demonstrations, a childrens craft tent & entertainment, masterclasses & lectures, great food and live music!



this year we will be showing our oak edge and cornish slate dining table with benches, so if you have always wanted to see one (or buy one), now is your chance.
the pieces of cornish slate that were cut from the local quarry for us to be used for this table & benches are really beautiful, a deep blue/black colour with streaks of quartz and tiny flecks of fools gold.



we will also be selling new work - beautiful oak mirrors & our oak & ash chopping/serving boards, as well as reclaimed cornish slate mirrors, clocks, our delicate leaf lanterns and more.

we hope to see you at the show.

the contemporary craft fair, mill marsh park, bovey tracey, devon
5th - 7th june open daily 10am to 5pm
www.craftsatboveytracey.co.uk

art: zoe hyde

we missed the private view last night of Zoe's latest exhibition, mainly because we had taken work to Stow on the Wold for a photo shoot (details about that later) and had got back too late and too tired. The exhibition is on at Docton Court Gallery in Appledore but only until 7th june so we have to be quick. We really like Zoe's work, the colours are stunning and the shapes and figures feel like little secret thoughts and memories peeping through the blues and the pinks.

Here are a few of our favourites. My favourite of all (because it makes me think of my mum) "to know that she is happy now" has sold - I'd like to have seen that one.

to know that she is happy now.

only for a while.

looking out.


to see more of Zoe's work: www.zoehyde.co.uk

to visit the exhibition: Docton Court Gallery, 2 Myrtle Street, Appledore, Devon, ex39 1ph. - 27th may to 7th june.

summer 09

our summer 09 newsletter is now online. click here to view.

more details of our summer shows and open studios coming very soon.

lots to tell you all but so so busy right now, a week until our 1st summer show!

the sunshine is coming tomorrow, we promise.

our materials: steel

steel:
reclaimed rusty steel might not be the first material that springs to mind when you think of contemporary furniture (or any indoor furniture for that matter) but we tend to use it in our designs quite alot. we have always found inspiration from waste materials, and metal that has been discarded and left to go rusty has beautiful qualities to it.
the bright oranges and deep browns of rust compliment oak so well.
the pieces that we use are either flat plates that come from shipyards or unusual shaped pieces that we sometimes use for handles on furniture.
sometimes they are bolted with huge rusty nails to old blocks of oak and they are really difficult to remove without them bending out of shape, so we quite often have to bash them back into shape. Then we remove the excess rust, clean them up & treat the metal with a sealant so there is no further rust.





as well as that contrast of rusty steel with oak, we also love the way that new stainless steel or powder-coated steel compliments old oak too.
shiny industrial stainless steel or powder-coated black steel in perfectly straight pieces or box sections work so well with the narly old reclaimed oak that we use on our coffee tables.
our reclaimed rusty steel is often used as the sides & handles of our console tables and, when we very rarely find longer pieces of flat steel, we use them to wrap around the sides & top of our oak sideboards.






next: new cornish slate

images: top left: stainless steel & oak coffee table top right: rusty steel & oak sideboard bottom left: low steel & oak coffee table bottom right: rusty steel & oak console table with drawer

sofas

our new kitchen floor is painted at last and we are slowly but surely putting everything back in there and building new cupboards and shelving for it. It won't be finished for a while yet as we have so much coming up in June (2 shows and 2 open studios - more details very soon) so the next 3 weeks will be taken up with making new work to show you at the summer events.
In the meantime we have been dreaming about maybe having a sofa in our kitchen in front of our lovely woodburner - here are some of our favourites.



hepburn sofa by matthew hilton


kashan by philipp mainzer for e15



loft sofa by baileys



divine recline long banquette by ochre




chaise-longue by pachadesign

the chaise-longue above is by us. we designed it for a commission based on a sofa that we had already designed & made for our living room. the base has storage space for bed linen or pillows and is on castors so it can be easily moved about. there are more images on the commissions page on our website.

the sofa decision will have to wait for a little while, knowing us we will probably design & make something new - we'll let you know.

our materials: reclaimed cornish slate

we have told you a little about where our reclaimed oak is sourced, now we'll explain about the reclaimed slate that we use.

reclaimed cornish slate:
like all of our materials, we spend alot of time sourcing & choosing the right pieces. The slate comes from old buildings and are sometimes so dirty that it's impossible to see the colours and markings underneath. It's alot of work cleaning them up, sometimes having to chip away at cement and bitumen just to get to the slate. But once we have cleaned them up we can see the beautiful colours and markings in each piece, a mixture of deep & light blues, little patches of rusty orange, greys, browns and blacks, and sometimes a real defined contrast of lights & darks. Every single piece of slate is different which makes each thing that we make unique.




Glenn hand cuts each piece and then polishes the slate to reveal more of the colours that have occured due to the slate being weathered for years and years and years. We use reclaimed cornish slate in our accessories range for our mirrors, ranging from small portrait ones to huge sculptural panoramic ones. We also make a range of clocks from this beautiful slate, polishing a circle for the face of the clock so it's really smooth and leaving the rest of the slate slightly textured.




next: steel

images: top left: small portrait mirror top right: large square clock bottom left: panoramic mirror bottom right: long rectangular clock

zephyr and blue

the weather here is awful today.
we have to deliver some furniture to London soon.
glenn is chainsawing a lovely old beam into boards for a coffee table commission.
I have a trillion lanterns to make.
we need to paint our kitchen floor before we can put everything back in there.
our 1st summer show is in 3 weeks time! (details coming soon).

we could do with a holiday - here would be nice (click the image to watch the summer 09 film by toast).



have a nice weekend, despite the rain.

our materials: reclaimed oak

we thought we would tell you a little more about the materials that we use for our furniture & accessories. They are a huge part of what we do and picking the right piece of wood or slate or metal for each piece that we design is very important to us.

reclaimed oak:
sometimes we take forever looking through old oak joists, dock blocks, old floorboards & old fence posts to choose the best bits to buy, which isn't always easy as the oak isn't beautifully clean, straight, sanded pieces when we first find them. They are weathered, dirty and very dark, so it's only until we start to work with them that the warm colour underneath is revealed. We try not to change them too much (we obviously clean them up quite a bit) but it is the decay and rawness and imperfections that we love.
our reclaimed oak is salvaged from local shipyards, skips, farmyards, building sites & our local tip.



we use reclaimed oak in our designs for coffee tables, dining tables, benches, and console tables, as well as tea-light blocks and mirrors (look out for our new reclaimed oak mirror design on the website soon).
the reclaimed oak on our furniture is finished with an eco hard wax oil that protects & seals it but doesn't change the look and feel of it and keeps it to a matt finish.



next: reclaimed cornish slate

images: top left: low steel and oak coffee table top right: oak edge & slate dining table with benches bottom left: square oak coffee table bottom right: off-set oak console table

teepay

teepay.
a new concept from howies.
design your own tee shirts.
we like this.


design what you would like on a tee shirt, upload your design to the teepay site, if your design gets 50 orders or more, teepay print them and sell them and you get a percentage of sales.
all designs are printed on 100% organic cotton t-shirts.

www.teepay.com

our off-set oak console table

another new piece on our website - our off-set reclaimed oak console table.
we had been saving this reclaimed oak board used for the top for ages as we wanted to use it for a really simple piece - it has such beautiful markings, a long scar in the oak runs along the middle of the board.
all the reclaimed oak boards that we use are lovely but this piece is particularly nice.
we have kept the base as simple as possible.

shops: story

a favourite of ours in London, story sells vintage clothing, natural objects, tribal jewellery, sculptural contemporary clothes & furniture, glassware, costume jewellery & vintage bags, string: jute, hemp, coir & leather and organic cosmetics.

story: 4 wilkes street, spitalfields, london, e16qf

story n changing and evolving .... heart and soul, masculine and feminine, lived in and loved, easy and mellow, earthy and rustic, raw and pure, holistic and realistic, simple and honest, unique and antique [.... a funky laid back space]

nuno nuno books

suké suké: the emperor's new fabrics

1. revealing, allowing the other side (inside) to show through.
2. sheer, gossamer, diaphanous; translucent.
3. flimsy; so thin as to present no barrier.

nuno nuno book volume 2 gathers together 22 fabrics literally of suké suké ("see-through") clarity.


























kira kira: the polish of power

1. glittering, glistening, glimmering, twinkling, sparkling: shiny.
2. dazzling, brilliant, bright.
3. resplendant, gala; gaily attired (cf. kirabiyaka finely appointed).
4. high-pitched and intermittent (as in laughter).

nuno nuno book volume 5 showcases 26 kira kira ("shiny") fabrics.


http://www.nuno.com/

our rusty steel & oak sideboard

another one of our new pieces that we have recently added to our furniture page on our website - the reclaimed rusty steel that we use to clad the top and sides of the sideboard is protected with a sealant so it won't rust any further.
we don't find long pieces of reclaimed rusty steel very often - at the moment we have one other piece that is a little longer but not quite as deep, so this sideboard is pretty much a one-off.
there is an image of the back of the sideboard on the website too (it's just as beautiful as the front).

featured artists: higher market studio

Higher Market Studio is a cool little shop in Penryn, Cornwall owned by a friend of ours Lucy Turner. Lucy specialises in bespoke, sustainable design by re-inventing old furniture with laser cut laminate in beautiful colours and designs. Most pieces are 50's & 60's designs from manufacturers like G-Plan and are given a totally new lease of life with Lucy's cut out designs of flowers, birds & more. As well as her own pieces, Lucy has a range of ceramics, lighting & interior products in the shop from other local designers.
Higher Market Studio was recently in Elle Decoration Magazine as one of their favourite country shops. You can visit on Wednesdays from 10am to 5pm and Saturdays 10am to 2pm.

Higher Market Studio: 19 higher market street, penryn, cornwall, tr10 8ed
web: www.highermarketstudio.co.uk
tel: 01326 374191