Makers' Eye

Makers' Eye would like to offer their congratulations to all Wood Awards 2015 finalists and winners! The Wood Awards have become established as the nations most respected recognition of the finest and most creative work in the UK using timber as its primary material. The disciplines range from complete buildings, through interiors, to furniture and... other products. Nine categories in all. At Makers' Eye, as winners of the Wood Awards 2014 Bespoke Furniture category, we know exactly how great this feels, and how important it can be for any business. We won our award as a result of our being asked to design and make nearly 200 pieces of finely crafted solid oak furniture for St Hugh's College Oxford's new Dickson Poon building, designed by David Morley Architects. The building was designed to create a residential centre for international students of Chinese culture, and as such carried within its contemporary form some subtle traditional influences. It was these we were able to successfully reflect to our work, complementing, whilst never competing with, the architect's outstanding creation. The learning process for us in working the St Hugh's team, headed by Vicki Stott, their visionary bursar, was intense but extremely rewarding. It has created a much higher profile for us within the bespoke furniture industry, and given us the confidence and expertise to orchestrate our multi talented workshops for new projects , large and small. For 2015 the beautiful work of recently established End Grain, with their innovative employment of colourfully stained, geometrically patterned furniture, and the respected designer Gareth Neal's brilliantly conceived table pieces for Zaha Hadid carry the baton onward. Major awards such as these can, though a wonderful recognition of past and current work, can perhaps even more importantly, be the start of something new. We hope that the outstanding winning work and fully will do the same for their creators as ours did for us, and we will be watching their progress with great interest!Read More