“I could often be found in a church underneath a table, with a vicar saying, ‘What are you doing?’” recalls Jerry Fisher of his early days researching joinery techniques in period properties and museum collections. “We trained ourselves by copying the original pieces.”
Fisher, who became a master carver after studying painting and sculpture, is one of five craftsmen who established Stuart Interiors in Somerset in 1976. Its niche is creating bespoke oak joinery in a range of historical styles. Today, the multi-family business’s oak-panelled rooms, elaborately carved interiors, grand staircases and libraries grace Elizabethan manors, Georgian town houses and contemporary buildings around the world. It counts the National Trust, English Heritage and Historic Royal Palaces among its clients, and projects have included the Tower of London, the restoration of Henry VIII’s apartments in Hampton Court Palace and the replication of Admiral Nelson’s mahogany campaign furniture on the HMS Victory.
The founders relied initially on a piecework model to complete their commissions, calling on the specialist skills of a larger group of woodworkers when needed. This guild-derived system allowed them to branch out from Jacobean furniture into entire rooms, houses and historic recreations.
For private commissions, they blend heritage techniques with modern elements, maintaining traditional joinery and craft while “making it functional for 21st-century living”, says partner Rebecca Fisher, Jerry’s daughter. She and Jake Russell, the son of Peter Russell, another co-founder, oversee a workshop of about 10 craftspeople in Prague, as well as collaborating with independent UK-based artisans.
Contemporary projects often involve incorporating hidden AV systems, lighting or technology. A Victorian Gothic entertaining space they designed for one client, for example, includes a 38-seat table that sinks down to become a dance floor. A coffered oak ceiling with tracery panels was built for another client to shade a swimming pool. In recent years, secret doors — which swing open at the tug of a particular book — have become a sought-after element in libraries.
The company prides itself on reviving and reinterpreting diverse historic styles: delicate parchemin or linenfold panelling, intricate rosette and acanthus leaf motifs, and formal Neoclassical elements. Staircases have included elaborate Gothic tracery balusters and finials shaped into mythical creatures, or followed the simplified lines of the Arts and Crafts movement.
Quarter-sawn oak is a speciality — a more labour-intensive cutting method that makes boards less likely to warp and more likely to reveal lively flecks and rays in the grain. “There’s so much going on in each individual panel — it’s almost like the flickering of a flame,” says Rebecca Fisher.
“We get to play with some amazing buildings,” says her father. “You never make two things the same . . . well, unless you make a pair of things.”
Doors from £2,500; staircases from £5,000; lead time from 6 months; stuartinteriors.com/bespoke-interiors
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