Sourcing local wood for making sustainable furniture

Sourcing timber for my furniture has always been a really important part of my business. Not only because beautiful timber makes beautiful furniture, but because the provenance of the materials I use really matters to me. I sometimes despair when I see furniture makers - both young and experienced, using timbers such as Indian Rosewood, teak, and other tropical hardwoods. When I source my materials for my sustainable wooden furniture, it is not simply about purchasing a quantity of timber from one supplier. I have spent years working with a network of local woodsmen - from medium sized businesses to private woodland owners. Often I seek pieces out specifically to create my pieces of furniture or for a commission or to sell either through my online shop, or via independent galleries. It is hand-selected by me using years of experience and local knowledge from the woodsman that I source from. The qualities I seek in each tree are immensely important, we make our lamps from sweet chestnut from Bovey Tracey, ash from a small woodland owner near Tavistock. I always buy from carefully managed woodlands – each tree felled will be replaced by another younger sapling, allowing it to thrive, thereby helping to sustain a vibrant, diverse and healthy woodland.  Much of my timber comes from coppice woods.  Coppicing retains the healthy rootstock of the tree, meaning new shoots are vigorous, and healthy and grow.

Sustainably sourcing my materials means more than just planting a tree for each one that is cut down or checking to see if it has a sustainability stamp on it from where timber has been imported.   Sustainably sourcing materials means reducing transport time, energy consumption, and sourcing locally. It means knowing my local woods and the woodsmen who care for them. It means using every last piece we acquire. Wood shavings and small offcuts left over from the making process in the workshop are used to heat that same workshop on the colder winter days. As a woodworker and passionate custodian of the earth, creating truly sustainable wooden furniture is followed through from start to finish. All of my pieces are made to last decades, and are designed to be future family heirlooms.  It is also worth remembering that around 50% of a tree’s dry weight is carbon, meaning that carbon is locked up for the life of the furniture.

The finishes I use are made from a blend of natural oils. Buying furniture from me means you are buying truly sustainable furniture.

Sweet chestnut bench using timber felled and planked a few miles from the workshop. Sweet chestnut legs from Haytor.

One of the joys of using locally sourced wood directly from the forests and woods of Devon, is that I can use beautifully unique and unusual boughs and planks to create bespoke designs. Curved garden benches made with naturally curved boughs, stunning wooden lampshades that showcase their intricate grain as the light shines through them, and handmade wooden lamps whose design echos the woodland they come from. Timber selection is so important to me. Just by looking at the pieces of furniture that I make, you can see the shape, movement and life of the woodland they came from. 

A beautiful Burr London Plane top from sustainably sourced local timber.

There really is no need to use timber from overseas. We have stunning sustainable timbers right here on our doorstep. I source my wood from various providers in Devon - here are a few.

All these people, through their understanding and experience, contribute to the authenticity of my work with their knowledge!

Anton Coaker at Hexworthy on dartmoor provides me with board material

https://devontimber.co.uk/ at Drewsteighton

Zav Bowden at Dart Valley Timber is based near Landscove and mills a big range of Devon-grown English hardwoods.

Lumber Jill Milling in Ivybridge has a mobile sawmill and a big selection of live edge boards suitable for green woodworking.

Grantland Timber in Mid-Devon mill a whole variety of live edge boards and are able to mill very wide boards.

John Moody is based just outside Modbury - a traditional boat builder, he also sells timber suitable for boat building, and steam bending. 01548 831075

Dave Curno, who volunteers at Burrator is passionate about ensuring our beautiful local timbers do not end up as firewood.

Andy Moreton at Sallerton wood supplies me with green ash. Alan Paine at Dartington supplies me with oak and other local timbers.

Carl Allerfeld at Haytor is my main supplier of unseasoned sweet chestnut and often stocks some very niceoak, chestnut, birch and beech board material.

Many of these people have no website, but you are welcome to contact me if you’d like to get in touch with them.

Another excellent source of sustainable local timber in Devon is Mike Gardner at Woodmanship based near Haldon Hill not far from Exeter.

Brown oak desk top from timber planked by me from an area of woodland outside Yealmpton. Ash legs from coppiced wood from the Dartington Estate.