Marc's Wood Bespoke Joinery

custom handmade furniture from natural wood

Latest furniture designs & news from Marc & Rachel in Somerset

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Welcome to our early autumn news from Marc Wood Joinery in Somerset. We have been busy crafting our handmade wooden furniture, selling from the Ilminster Emporium and getting design inspiration from our favourite Devon beaches. This month we feature our bespoke wooden sink stand bathroom cabinet and 5 star reviews for our wooden wall mirror with shelf.

Hello from Somerset, our new bathroom cabinet designs and more!

We hope that you are keeping cosy and warm as these autumnal evenings draw in, our log burner has roaring away this past week (we do have quite a lot of wood bits to use up) and our Jack Russell ‘Marv’ absolutely loves lying in his favourite place by the hearth.

We love our dog assistant Marv, here at Marc Wood Joinery in Somerset. Our lovely Jack Russell terrier keeps us company and is a great excuse to get out and about when we need to take a break from our furniture workshop. In the autumn he loves to keep cosy and warm by the log burning stove.

We are really enjoying helping out in the Ilminster Emporium, admiring our fellow traders lovely items and finding lots of great ideas for Christmas presents; Rachel even has her eye on a vintage chair or two.

We have also been creating new variations of our classic bathroom cabinet, supporting our town’s fundraising efforts, beach combing in Devon & discovering that fashion designer Alice Temperley has just set up here in Ilminster.

Get 10% discount off our Etsy shop prices by buying your handmade wooden furniture, picture frames and mirrors directly from Marc Wood Joinery in Somerset.
Marc Wood Bespoke Joinery in Somerset, handmade wooden bathroom cabinet, kitchen cabinets, wall mirrors and picture frames in sustainable natural wood.

   10% discount off our Etsy shop prices

This offer is available for all direct sales (not delivery costs) via PayPal or BACS, email us for more information.

At Marc Wood Joinery we were commissioned to create a bespoke version of our classic 'dovetail' wooden cabinet to hold a ceramic sink. In early autumn our bestseller in our online shop was our slim wooden bathroom cabinet and we made a nautical rope and wood towel rail in our Somerset workshop.

Our Dovetail cabinet as a sink stand
Our Devon based customer Shaun asked us to create a bespoke version of our classic ‘dovetail’ wooden cabinet to hold a ceramic sink.

We think it looks great and it adds a natural, rustic character to the renovation of their beautiful 19th century home.

New Bathroom Accessories
We recently created a quirky nautical towel rail for our lovely local repeat customer Emma and we think that the contrast of wood and rope works really well.

September’s Bestseller
Our slim bathroom cabinet with a single solid wooden door in the ‘antique’ Danish Oil finish became the month’s bestselling style, this cabinet features our ‘hidden’ handle and 3 generous shelves to hold a variety of bathroom essentials.

For our latest designs, check in with our  Instagram and our Facebook page.

5 star Reviews
We are now into double figures with our reviews on Google and it is really helping our little business to stand out on the web, so huge thanks to all who have taken the time to leave us a comment or two.

Our lovely repeat customer Ivor gave us 5 stars on the 29th September and left a detailed review of the wide wooden wall shelf which we recently made for him.

“ Excellent craftsmanship and great design and very good price. I am pleased, as ever with my third purchase from Marc Wood. Highly recommended”

If you have the time to support us by leaving a review, please visit our Google My Business Page.

Our Etsy.com shop continues to be busy and everyone has been very kind and patient with our longer lead times, we have now managed to get this down to 6 weeks from 8.

Marc and our team are all working very hard and we and hope to be able to offer 2 weeks for our gift items, in time for Christmas.

Here is our latest 5 star review about our smaller mirror with shelf and water resistant Danish Oil finish:

“ This beautiful mirror, looks amazing in my bathroom, thank you so much” Claire, 6th October 2020.

We found our latest design inspiration while wandering along our favourite Devon beaches near Challaborough Bay.

Shaped by the sea, the twisted and weathered driftwood we found is going to make up the basis of our new tea light holder and lamp designs.

Keep a watch on our social pages for more developments.

The Ilminster Emporium shop

We continue to establish ourselves as a venue for high quality home interiors and gifts, we have seen an increase in visitors and we will be opening late on a Wednesday for gift buying as Christmas approaches.

Save our town flags!

We have been supporting our town’s fundraising efforts to replace the colourful flags which fly outside of shops and businesses during the warmer months.

A raffle has been organised (the closing date to buy tickets is the end of October) there are £1,170 worth of prizes on offer, with the first prize valued at £500, all from small businesses, including a handmade wooden wall mirror donated by ourselves.

We need £7,000 to replace the flags, if you would like to support us you can also donate via our Just Giving page.

High fashion in our high street

Temperley London have set up a hub of offices and a shop in our pretty little town of Ilminster.

The arrival of such a well known fashion house is great for our town profile and for our local economy. We know of several young people who have now secured part time jobs with the company, which is a fantastic boost to their prospects.

We will be back with another update next month, if you have any questions or if there is anything which we can create for your home, just ask. 

Best Wishes,
Marc & Rachel Wood



New mirror designs and updates from Marc & Rachel, August 2020

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Marc Wood Joinery handmade sustainable wooden picture frames, mirrors and custom handmade modern rustic farmhouse furniture in Somerset Blog News August 2020
Our latest handmade mirror designs & more from Somerset:
We hope that you are getting safely back into your routine now that summer is at an end.
Late summer updates: In-between creating some new designs and digitising our paperwork, we have been getting ready for our son’s return to year 6 in school and even finding a few days to celebrate our 9 year wedding anniversary in lovely Devon.
Our workshop team continue to settle into their new ‘socially distanced’ working space, which has inspired Rhian to set up a home workshop of her own!
Get 10% discount off our Etsy shop prices by buying your handmade wooden furniture, picture frames and mirrors directly from Marc Wood Joinery in Somerset.
Marc Wood Bespoke Joinery in Somerset, handmade wooden bathroom cabinet, kitchen cabinets, wall mirrors and picture frames in sustainable natural wood.
10% discount off our Etsy shop prices
As seen on our website, this offer is available for all direct sales (not delivery costs) via PayPal or BACS, email us for more information.
Mirror designs include our very popular handmade mirror with shelf, mirror with shelf and cast iron hooks and mirror with shelf and upcycled coat hanger hooks. Each handcrafted from sustainable natural wood by Marc Wood Joinery, Ilminster Somerset UK.
Our Dovetail mirror in natural Oak.
Our local customer (and plant expert!) Clare asked us to create our classic ‘dovetail’ mirror frame in natural Oak to compliment the new doors and window-ledges of her characterful period cottage renovation.
We love the deep grain which has been really brought out by the application of a clear Osmo Oil finish (see our Facebook page for more of our handmade pieces in their new homes)
Enjoying the west-country
During the school holidays we met up with the old gang from Exeter for a family friendly camper van weekend in Porlock and the children wore off some of that lock-down energy playing until dusk.
Then we spent some time with Rachel’s family in Devon, walking Marv on the beach and enjoying big barbecue dinners.
We are making some more items for sale in our Somerset shop space at The Emporium in Ilminster and there are lots of local artisan traders joining us all the time.
If you are passing by, it is well worth a visit to our lovely little Somerset town.
New Furniture Designs 
We created a bespoke chunky chest of drawers with matching rustic beside table for our lovely Etsy.com customer in London and they kindly got in touch to let us know how happy they are with our work.
A smaller version of these drawers is usually available on our website and in our Etsy shop, we have temporarily closed this listing and others for our larger pieces while we get ready for the full return of our team.
We hope to drop our extra long 8 week lead time very soon, once we have caught up and we really appreciate everyone’s patience and kindness during the long wait.
We also made a large picture frame to house an embroidery sampler and our creative customer has taken the time to send us a photo, we love the way our wooden frame compliments the farmhouse style mantelpiece.
We are now making a new style set of ‘architects drawers with a mix of ceramic and library handles, we will be sharing photos once completed, so check in with our  Instagram.
August’s Bestseller
Our classic large bathroom cabinet with double dovetail mirror doors in the ‘antique’ Danish Oil finish became the month’s bestselling style, this cabinet features our ‘hidden’ handles on the lower front pieces of the doors. Marc wanted to maintain the sleek lines of the subtle curved edges and also to use as much of the wood ‘offcuts’ as possible in order to reduce waste.
5 star Reviews We have a profile on Yell.com (or as we used to know it, the 'Yellow Pages'!)
5 star Reviews
We have a profile on Yell.com (or as we used to know it, the ‘Yellow Pages’!)
“ Marc made a superb bathroom cabinet for us. Excellent craftsmanship and a pleasure to deal with”
Mike gave us 5 stars on 7th September and left a lovely comment about the large bespoke bathroom cabinet which we recently made for him.
Our Etsy shop continues to be busy since we re-opened back in May, here is our latest brilliant review from Sally on 8th September:
“ We love this mirror. Its beautifully made and just the right size. We requested the item to be a bit smaller than advertised which Marc was extremely helpful in accommodating. It arrived superbly packed and is perfect for our requirements. Thank you so much”
Marc and Rachel Wood run Marc Wood Bespoke Joinery from their Somerset workshop.
We will be back with another update next month, if you have any questions or if there is anything which we can create for your home, just ask. 

Best Wishes,
Marc & Rachel Wood

Our latest handmade furniture &’Lock Down’ life in Somerset.

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We hope that you are staying safe and well during this health emergency, our online shop is closed and we have put the team on furlough, Marc is single manning the furniture workshop and we are taking on a low volume of orders (lead times have increased by 1 – 2 weeks)

Although we are very grateful for all of the support from the local council, NHS and essential workers helping us through, it has taken quite a bit of adjustment and stress here in the Wood household, as we know that it has for many of us.

We are enjoying spending family time on our daily walks through the Somerset countryside, which is on our doorstep (see our Instagram for more pics) and we can amuse ourselves with classic board-games from the loft, plus the boys got home haircuts last week!
At Marc Wood Bespoke Joinery in Somerset UK we craft furniture, mirrors and picture frames from sustainable natural wood. Our modern rustic wooden furniture designs are custom made to order and we can deliver and install near to Bath, Bristol, Exeter, Dorset and Taunton.
We were very excited to launch our new shop space in the Ilminster Emporium at the end of March, we held a party in the shop with local small businesses and our friends and family, the Mayor even helped out by cutting the ribbon, marking the official opening!
After several great weeks in this very lovely iconic building in the old town centre we all made the decision to close up our shop just before the ‘lock-down’ went into effect across the UK.
Although it was sad to say goodbye to all the other lovely Emporium traders and our new friends on the committee, we all felt that it was irresponsible to encourage visitors into the town as the virus took hold across the country.
We will all be back with great new displays as soon as we can and we hope that you will be able to visit the Emporium on Silver Street on your next visit to South Somerset.
At Marc Wood Bespoke Joinery in Somerset UK we craft furniture, mirrors and picture frames from sustainable natural wood. Our modern rustic wooden furniture designs are custom made to order and we can deliver and install near to Bath, Bristol, Exeter, Dorset and Taunton.
In the days before we made the decision to close the workshop we also completed our latest handmade pieces.  A chunky modern rustic sideboard (seen here in it’s new home!) and our new design of ‘tall boy’ chest of drawers, which is pictured in our studio and is now in Scotland thanks to our dedicated specialist courier Barry Whitcher, who is still working hard ensuring that items get from A to B across the country.
Both of these pieces of furniture make use of our classic ‘cut out’ handle and we will be featuring the ‘tall boy’ and lots of other new handmade items in our online shop once we are open again.
At Marc Wood Bespoke Joinery in Somerset UK we craft furniture, mirrors and picture frames from sustainable natural wood. Our modern rustic wooden furniture designs are custom made to order and we can deliver and install near to Bath, Bristol, Exeter, Dorset and Taunton.
This April we reached the milestone of 100 subscribers to our YouTube channel and we will be adding more videos in the coming weeks, find us under Marc Wood Joinery.
Woodworking tips & tricks:
This month we have an ingenious tip for smooth sanding around a curve.
It can be challenging to sand a curve and you often need your piece of sanding paper to be solid yet supple enough to carefully remove surface layers whilst fitting into the required shape.
Cover a flexible A5 notepad with sandpaper of the necessary grade for your needs and curve the notepad to fit into the curve of your wood then you have a very useful and study sanding pad.
If you place an edge of the sanding paper into the notebook, the pages will secure it as you apply pressure. Find out more about woodworking technique on this great easy to read blog.

We will be back with another update next month and if there is anything which we can create for your home, just ask. 

Best Wishes,
Marc & Rachel Wood



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