We recently welcomed 5 new students to our school for our September intake. They’re a great group of people from a range of different backgrounds, who all have different reasons for joining us at the school, and it goes to show that anyone can turn their hand to furniture making as long as they have the passion. So what kinds of backgrounds do our students have? Does it matter if you don’t have any experience?
Many students join us from quite a corporate background, from areas like finance or insurance. A lot of us can relate to the feeling of being cooped up in an office day after day without a creative outlet. Sometimes students have taken up woodworking as a hobby and want to take it further, while others have never tried it but feel they want a completely new career! Furniture designing and making is a fantastic choice for those who feel tired of the corporate lifestyle, since the design aspect provides a great creative outlet, and working with your hands and making things is very satisfying work, particularly after a computer-heavy career.
We also get students who join us from a more traditional carpentry background, so already have experience with woodworking. Many people get into carpentry and woodworking because of their love for the craft, but end up in more commercial lines of work like kitchen fitting. Of course, there is nothing wrong with being a kitchen fitter, but we have heard from past students that the work can be very repetitive, and not very creative or challenging. We enjoy welcoming traditional woodworkers into our school who are keen to expand their knowledge and push their skills to the next level. Our course teaches them how to work with mixed medias, so they can create pieces using materials like resin and metal. It also gives them the opportunity to be creative, in coming up with their own design ideas and working on their creative problem solving skills as they figure out how to bring their design to life.
Other students come to us from an arts or design background, who feel they want to apply their creative design skills to something practical. We have had students join us after studying Fine Art, who want to apply their knowledge to something new and develop their skills in a different but complementary area. Product Design is another background that transitions well into furniture design – whether you have just graduated with a degree in Product Design, or you have experience in working as a product designer, we find our course can take skills you already have and develop them. Many students who have studied product design often study smaller products, gadgets, or technology, and so taking these creative problem-solving skills and applying them to larger items can be exciting and challenging.
Don’t worry if you don’t have any experience in design or with making – that’s what we’re here for. If you have no experience, we’ll teach you everything from the ground up, and if you have some experience, we’ll help you to refine and expand your skills. We get students from a wide range of different backgrounds – the only things you need to join us are a passion for furniture design and a strong work ethic.
If you’re thinking about joining us and you want to talk a bit more about whether we’re the right school for you, feel free to call us anytime to chat. We’re also happy for you to come in and visit the school, take a tour, and chat to the tutors about the course. Email us or give us a call to arrange a time that suits you.
