I saw Ted Jefferis’ leather Hangup lamps at Total Fabrication at Craft Central during the London Design Festival and was immediately captivated. The son of a boat builder, Ted studied at Oxford Brookes University, where he began to explore the concept of furniture as a scaled down form of architecture. I was keen to find out more…
What’s the most important thing to know about you?
I love wood!
When you were five, what did you want to be when you grew up?
An architect
And now?!
An architect, but without building regulations and planning rules.
How did you first get into design?
I have been messing around with wood and making things for as long as I can remember. I left school early and worked in a shop for a while. After about six months I got very bored and decided to enrol on a cabinet-making course.
What inspires your designs?
Structure, form and the tactile nature of materials.
Talk me through your design and making process from initial idea to final product.
I start with an idea of what I want to make and how I might do it. I will then think about it a lot, in fact, I will think of nothing else. Then, I will sketch and develop the idea. I will have a go at making it, normally out of scrap material – this prototyping usually goes on for a while but I never complete a prototype. By this stage, I normally have a pressing deadline for something else so I will put it on the back burner for a while. When I then come back to it I have loads of new enthusiasm. Then I try to make the final piece straight away.
What’s your favourite part of the process?
Seeing the finished item of furniture in its new home.
Describe a really good day and a really bad day in the life of Ted Jefferis.
Good day: Sunny and calm in the workshop with minimal distractions, and a good lunch.
Bad day: Raining with a strong northerly wind, the phone ringing a hundred times before 11am, then realising that I have run out of something and have to go out and get more.
Further reading for the especially geeky:
- interview :: richard brendon
- interview :: tom pigeon
- interview :: kate farley
- interview :: aud julie befring
With thanks to Creative Co-Op for the photography.
