Following a week of whittling, Sunday saw the close of our Great Heal’s Bodging Race. Transforming our windows into a working studio, 6 top designers from around the globe battled the clock to each produce a handmade chair (and not forgetting a stool) using the ancient English craft of bodging. Needless to say, we all […]
Featuring 6 world-renowned designers competing live in-store, the Great Heal’s Bodging Race promises to be a unique piece of retail theatre. Putting their own modern spin on the traditional English craft of ‘bodging’, our illustrious guests will be making bespoke chairs throughout the opening week of the Heal’s Modern Craft Market. All of the one-off […]
The name Cristóbal Balenciaga looms large in the history of STUA. Designing and manufacturing in their hometown of San Sebastian, the Gasca family have long been influenced by their relationship with the legendary couturier. Acting as a live mannequin for Balenciaga, Jesús Gasca’s mother would stand for hours while the designer sculpted his creations directly […]
Innovation is no small task. So it’s no surprise that designers and craftsmen are always on the lookout for visual material to nurture their next creative breakthrough. One such example is Matthew Hilton, a mainstay of the Heal’s showroom thanks to his naturally evolving yet novel approach to design. Keen to find out where he […]
We sat down with Kirsty Whyte, the designer of our new Abacus bedroom range – a modern interpretation of Heal’s historic iron bedsteads – to discuss her inspiration. Can you describe Abacus to us? The Abacus bed was designed using a traditional early 20th Century iron bedstead as inspiration. Traditional detailing has been pared back […]
We spoke to our latest Limited Edition contemporary cushion designer, Laura Slater, about her new collection at Heal’s. What is the inspiration behind the cushion designs? The limited edition prints I have produced for Heal’s are a development of my signature collection ‘Assemble/Configure’ The print collection explores found shape, texture and pattern observed from the […]
It was in the year of 1810 – when King George III was declared insane, Napoleon Bonaparte divorced Josephine, Jane Austen wrote Sense and Sensibility and tinned cans were invented to preserve food – that John Harris Heal opened a small feather-dressing business at 33 Rathbone Place. Bringing a new, continental way of sleeping to […]
I absolutely love barbecues and as a family we are happy to barbecue any time of the year. If we are having steak, my husband will happily stand outside on a freezing November evening as there is nothing to beat a slightly charred black and blue ribeye. Now Summer is here it’s less of an […]
With the winning Heal’s Discovers designers announced, and their products selected, the Heal’s product team can crack on with process of developing and sampling. Each of this year’s designs are created using a different manufacturing process, so it was essential for the Heal’s team to choose the right supplier for each product. It was important […]
Our last (but certainly not least) Heal’s Discovers 2014 finalist is Tom Parfitt. His future as a designer was clear from a young age – he’s come a long way from constructing toys from cardboard boxes… After leaving school in 2005 Tom Parfitt started an apprenticeship in cabinet making at British furniture brand Benchmark, who […]
Next up on our roster of Heal’s Discovers 2014 finalists, we have a design duo: Phil Luscombe and Josh South. We’re glad they didn’t take up their initial intended careers in Gardening and the Military… Phil Luscombe and Josh South met while studying for their degrees in Three Dimensional Design, Furniture and Product at Northumbria […]
It’s time to introduce you to the second of our talented Heal’s Discovers finalists, Sam Lloyd. We caught up with him between his time working away in the studio and his other passion, scuba diving. Sam Lloyd has, in his own words ‘always had an interest in making things.’ When he was younger he used […]
