Tag Archives: Wood

by
The Burning Issue – Stop Incinerating Our Trees

Reply

A campaign led by the British Furniture Confederation has come to Tree Couture’s notice that we strongly believe is worthy of everyone’s attention who cares for trees and our fragile environment.

A petition has been set up by the BFC to reform the current government subsidies that go to the energy companies to burn wood as part of their renewables quota. Instead of getting their quota from wood-waste materials, or end-of-lifespan products, virgin wood is being incinerated.

As we know so well, to use timber sustainably, it goes through a natural lifecycle from planting to manufacturing BEFORE being recycled and eventually burnt for energy. Energy generating companies should only be able to burn wood that has gone through this lifecycle. However, over recent years, there has been an increase in the burning of virgin timber and we have to do everything we can to stop this.

It is particularly poignant for us at Tree Couture, being a company that works exclusively with sustainable timber and that plants a same species native sapling for every piece of handcrafted furniture we make, but in addition to the environmental impact of this legislation, significant damage is also being done to our furniture industry where wood prices are rocketing as a result. In the last 5 years alone, wood prices have increased by 55.1% in the UK and the industry has seen many British furniture companies failing as well as major job losses as a direct consequence.

If you agree we must protect our virgin timber and help look after our great furniture industry, please spread the word and sign the petition at the following link – it will take less than a minute. http://www.biomass-petition.org/

Thank you from us all at Tree Couture.

_____________________________________________________________________

Photo by Troo Heath-Crew

by
Bequeathing your flat-packs? I don’t think so!

1

Flat packsAs the countdown to the keys continues, (lots of moving {and unmoving!} parts; banks, lawyers, paperwork, wires, bank holidays!) I have used the waiting time to feverishly work on designs and create to do lists for the new atelier.

However, I have also done something that most people dread doing and procrastinate on endlessly – and that’s write a will. It’s no easy or pleasant task assessing your own worth and then working out how to distribute your belongings once you’ve shuffled off your mortal coil. Which is probably why, I’m told, such a considerable percentage of Brits die intestate. So there I was grappling around, rooting through drawers and trying to think what exactly constituted my worldly goods and indeed how to bolster my list when I had a moment of insight.

My flagging spirits lifted dramatically when it dawned on me that I could bequeath the pieces of Tree Couture fine furniture that I’d designed and made – solid wood, handcrafted and timeless. Yes I did have items of significant worth – both financially and, dare I be so bold to suggest, even sentimentally. And it got me thinking about an industry report I’d read a few years ago on actual lifespans of furniture in the UK.

Horrifyingly, it revealed that the average lifespan of a piece of furniture in Britain is a paltry seven years!

While obviously acknowledging what a dreadful waste of precious resources this represents - yet another shocking example of the disposable nature of our society – I was grateful and maybe even a little smug in the knowledge that, not only was my own handcrafted furniture sure to outlive me and plenty more generations, but it would keep and very probably gain value and just get better and better aesthetically. As what we flawed human beings and veneered MDF have in common is that we both age rather unfortunately.  Wood, on the other hand, ages beautifully when it’s solid and its patina develops and its real integral depth starts revealing itself.

It can certainly be argued that there’s a place for flat-pack furniture, such as the Ikea and Argos wonders of this modern world. Indeed it provides an affordable fashion-driven alternative to good, solid furniture. But it’s little more than an instant and very short-term fix, as industry statistics reveal that the average longevity of such pieces is just three years. A frightfully false economy as my grandmother would say.

So it is encouraging to see that, with the increase in interest in all things green and sustainable, people are thinking more seriously about furniture as investments, as fabulous functional design-and-craft statements that are not just for Christmas, but for life – and, indeed, beyond!