Hugh Birkett (Ex-Oliver Morel) Arts & Crafts Cotswold School Octagonal Mirror

Hugh Birkett (Ex-Oliver Morel Who Trained with Edward Barnsley at His Famous Workshop at Froxfield) (1919 to 2002): A very highly respected furniture maker and master craftsman who was heavily influenced by the work of Ernest Gimson, Romney Green and Edward Barnsley. He trained with one of the foremost former Edward Barnsley craftsmen, Oliver Morel before he established his own workshop in 1949 in Solihull and then in 1966 moved to Moreton-in-Marsh in. He made exceptional quality furniture in the tradition of the Arts & Crafts Cotswold School and was a member of the Red Rose Guild of Craftsmen, The Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society and The Crafts Centre of Great Britain

Oak: The most British of woods, that can produce really special results. Oak has been used for hundreds of years to construct everything from sea-going vessels to fine furniture. Quarter sawn boards are very straight grained and have distinctive growth rings and medullary rays that give a very beautiful effect as well as being renowned for their superior stability and strength

The Cotswold School was a development of the Arts and Craft Movement started largely by Ernest Gimson and the brothers Sidney and Ernest Barnsley. The furniture is instantly recognisable with its simple lines, attention to the finest of details, and use of beautiful materials. Cotswold School designs were crafted from local materials using traditional tools and techniques and with decorative details derived largely from utilitarian elements: exposed joinery, unusual panels, interesting pulls and latches crafted either from wood or from metal using traditional smithing techniques, and close attention to form as well as to wood grain and pattern. Where decorative details were added they generally took the form of traditional embellishment such as exposed joints, chamfered edges and chip carved edge details.The style was embraced and developed by other designers and craftsmen including Gordon Russell, Stanley Webb Davies in Cumbria, Sid Barnsley's son Edward, Arthur Romney Green in Hampshire, Robin Nance in St Ives and Ambrose Heal are a handful of such men out of many. The best developed their own style within the established tradition