Branching Out

Aiming to add value to hardwood management

In autumn 2019, internationally respected British designer and furniture maker, John Makepeace OBE, working with  Woodland Heritage, a charity of which he is a longstanding member, launched a Brief via the Royal Society of Arts (RSA) aimed at harnessing broad-leaved woodlands and their resources to increase their economic, social and environmental value.

One of nine challenges set within the RSA’s Student Design Awards for 2019-20, a scheme then in its 96th year, ‘Branching Out’ was aiming to encourage higher education students and recent graduates to explore innovative ways to utilise locally grown hardwoods, woodlands and their resources for the benefit of people, place, environment, and the economy.

The successful entrant would have to consider how their plans benefit the woodland, the ecosystem and the local economy; they would have considered the economic viability of the idea and potential routes to market, particularly if the proposal is a product.  All entrants were encouraged to consider a specific young woodland (probably one aged between 10-30 years old and of at least 5 acres), or a specific type of hardwood to contextualise the solution.

The Brief was set against a backdrop of over 40% of UK woodlands being under or un managed  with the prospect that the ‘Net-Zero’ proposal could see billions more trees being planted over just a few decades, all of which will add to the management burden, unless more economically viable products can come from this management and especially the thinnings that will result.

With most students coming from non-forestry backgrounds, getting to see a local woodland being managed and understanding how products can be used was a vital first step in preparing for the challenge. 

Students from Brunel University had their first introduction to woodland management courtesy of Oxfordshire Woodland Group, where the students were able to see  small diameter wood used as rafters in a cruck barn made entirely of timber sourced from the wood in which it stands.  This is the first cruck framed structure of its kind to be raised in Oxfordshire in over 500 years.

The Branching Out brief was viewed by thousands of interested students worldwide, leading to an eventual shortlist of eight.  The results were announced on 2 July 2020.

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