furniture school
Exciting News: Joseph Robinson Wins the Christopher Claxton Stevens Prize 2025! Our very own Joseph Robinson, a graduate of our 50-week Designer Makers’ course, has won the Christopher Claxton Stevens Prize for his stunning Gratus Bench. It’s also worth noting that Joseph’s win marks
Open Weekend with ArtWave Festival
6th – 7th September 2025 | Lewes District
Our annual open weekend during ArtWave is always a busy weekend
Open hours: 11am – 4pm
Graduate exhibition and Marc Fish’s studio open to all.
Free no need to book.
Next date: 2nd – 6th Nov. 2026.
If you’re looking to expand your machine woodworking skills, our 5-day hands-on wooden stool making course is for you.
£825.
Here at RHS we are excited to announce upcoming dates for the diary!
– New Designers, London – ArtWave, Lewes – Bespoke Guild Marks – Finalist with Heritage Crafts.
Ian Burnell completed our 50 week course and entered his chair and stool for the prestigious Bespoke Guild Mark from The Furniture’s Makers Company. This chair is a celebration of my love for birds, flight, and the iconic Supermarine Spitfire,
The Marshlands Drinks Cabinet, designed and made by Elliott Butterwick whilst a student at Robinson House Studio, has been awarded the Christopher Claxton Stevens Prize by The Furniture Makers’ Company, the City of London livery company and charity for the furnishing industry.
We are delighted to be taking several of our students and their work to New Designers, London
New Designers is an annual London showcase of the UK’s most innovative emerging design talent. Since its inception 39 years ago, New Designers has provided a platform for over 3,000 graduates every year to present their visionary ideas to industry professionals and the public.
Keep up-to-date with RHS news about Taster week courses, Weekend classes and Student work here on our Instagram account.
We are delighted announce an open weekend on Saturday 21st & Sunday 22nd September, 2024.
Open hours – 9.30am – 4.30pm.
We are proud to announce the Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) have credit rated robinson house studio‘s popular 50 Week Furniture Design and Makers’ course at SCQF Level 8, opening more opportunities for students wishing to study furniture design and making.
A new book by Marc Fish celebrating the last 10 years of furniture design.
Marc Fish has been making furniture for over 20 years, the release of his new book ‘a second decade of creativity’ charts the last ten years of Marc’s studio and highlights the progression in his work to date.
Luke Evans joined us in 2021 from Australia, he studied the 50 Week Furniture Design and Makers course. Here, three main pieces are designed and made giving students a good all round knowledge of the skills needed to make high-end work.
Maquette making is a useful way of planning a project. It helps the maker to see if proportions and materials work well together on a model, often very small.
Joe Robinson completed a 50 Week Furniture Design & Makers’ course.
Here you can see the three projects he completed in his time with us.
Fascinated by different landscapes, Joe has been looking at Iceland in particular and has taken inspiration from skeiðarársandur river delta. Made from valchromat and hand carved for the texture.
Robinson House Studio Workshop and surroundings tour and promotional video 2022.
Crafted Conservation: John Makepeace OBE and Marc Fish
The artists introduce their practices, both deeply rooted in experimental material science. With thanks to Sarah Myerscough and her gallery.
Christian Watson featured in Elle Deco, July 2021
We’re delighted to be back up and running not only with lockdown easing and an awful lot of risk assessments under our belts but our new premises is finished and amazing!
Tegan Foley writes “Constantly striving to transcend the barriers of art, design, sculpture and furniture, this iconic piece by Marc Fish really does stand in a class of its own.”
We were thrilled to see ex-student Anna Dugard’s wonderful console table featured in Furniture & Cabinetmaking magazine. F&C is an industry stalwart, it focuses exclusively on fine furniture with the aim of promoting excellence in furniture making, so we are always delighted to see our students’ work showcased.
Undoubtedly a singularly gifted and knowledgeable individual, it is reassuring to know that someone like Theo Cook is instructing and inspiring the next generation of furniture makers in their craft, as Martin Pim-Keirle discovers here.
Marc’s lesson on material science was one of the best lectures I have attended, it was inspiring and gave me many new ideas for mixing materials. Felix Wells.
Theo often shares his work and passion for woodworking on YouTube and has amassed a significant following over the years. Here we share with you some of his best videos with a short introduction to each.
In spring 2020 we moved into bigger, better, and newer premises! This means we’re expanding the school, the workshop, and our bench space, so we have new bench spaces available to rent in our shiny, new, well-equipped workshop. Update as of August
robinson house studio Furniture School’s New Premises.
We are absolutely delighted to have been able to secure new premises, still in central Newhaven with it’s great transport connections, in an amazing new building with eco-credentials and only a few minutes walk to the beach!
The new premises is 8,000 square feet and will provide new and improved facilities not only for our students but also our community of makers.
James Dabell studied with us for a year and created some great pieces during his course. Since graduating, he has gone on to work at bespoke furniture maker Silverlining, which we take students to visit on their course. We caught
Marc appeared in the Financial Times on September 20th 2019. The piece covered his design ethos and ambitions prior to showing with Todd Merrill at PAD London.
In the Newhaven studio of furniture-maker Marc Fish, Claudia Barbieri discovers how the designer bends wood to his will.
Out of all the pieces that received a Bespoke Guild Mark, the Claxton Stevens Prize is awarded to the best recipient from that year, recognising excellence in design, materials, craftsmanship and function for exquisite pieces of furniture.
There are so many directions students can go in once they finish studying with us, so we thought we would start highlighting a few of our alumni students and share with you what they’ve been up to since graduating. Laurent
So you’ve decided you want to be a furniture maker – spending your days in a workshop, coming up with great designs, building beautiful yet functional pieces from scratch. But where do you start? There’s a lot to consider, especially
School Founder and Principal Marc Fish has been featured in a recent issue of Modern Luxury magazine, after showing at the Design Miami exhibition. Marc Fish is represented in the US by gallery owner Todd Merrill, who showed Marc’s Ethereal
Marc Fish’s new piece, the Ethereal desk, was featured at the recent Design Miami exhibition, which ran from 4th-9th December 2018. Marc was pleased to be involved in the Todd Merrill Studio exhibition alongside artists such as Brecht Wright Gander,
Theo Cook, robinson house studio’s Vice Principal and Senior Tutor, has finished uploading his three-part series on how he made his bronze scraper plane. He enjoys making his own hand tools and has made many in the past, but making
The studio and the furniture school have been proud to have a heavy involvement with the Evolution of Tradition Exhibition at Design Centre Chelsea Harbour. The exhibition was in collaboration with the Furniture Makers’ Company, as the show exclusively exhibited
The Furniture Makers Company, along with Cube Video, have created this fantastic video about our work at the studio, how we strive to create new knowledge, and the value of a Bespoke Guild Mark award. We are showing Marc’s new desk,
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
Every year, robinson house studio brings our fantastic graduates to exhibit at New Designers, the annual graduate design exhibition held in London. We think this is a fantastic opportunity for students to participate in what may be their first exhibition,
Todd Merrill’s beautiful home was featured in a recent issue of Architectural Digest, showcasing some beautiful pieces from the designers he exhibits in his New York gallery, including three of Marc Fish’s pieces. The foyer features a chair from
Theo Cook is one of the only people in the world capable of creating this fantastic Japanese Sunrise Dovetail joint. He runs dovetail courses here at robinson house studio, so you can learn to make dovetails from one of the
How did you get into furniture making? By chance, I used to restore classic cars and got into welding and metal fabrication. I started making sculptures and furniture in metal. I had some early success but when this dried up
If you’re thinking about taking a course in furniture design and furniture making, it’s a good idea to take into account the location of the school. It’s such an important factor, since you’ll be living there for a considerable amount of time (we’ve already written about how great it is to be so close to Brighton), but also because it dictates what kind of extra-curricular things you can do.
How did you get into furniture making? Straight after I had finished my last exam at school I saw an advert for a furniture assembler and thought I would apply. I got the job and started straight away. The job
Tim Evershed was recently featured as ‘One to Watch’ in a Homes and Garden magazine article during October 2017.
Our one year furniture making course puts you in a great position to start your own furniture making business – and plenty of our students do! So we wanted to chat with some of our alumni who have gone on
It’s not just about the course, it’s also about the lifestyle surrounding that course – where you’ll be living, and how you’ll spend your time outside of the workshop. Chances are you’re taking a course that lasts at least a few months, and you don’t want to put your life on hold for that time.
You started out as a student here, what made you want to take the course? I did a design degree ages ago, and decided when I finished that degree that maybe it wasn’t quite what I wanted to get into,
In July we were thrilled to be part of the New Designers exhibition, showcasing our graduate students’ best work at our robinson house studio stall. Among our exhibitors were Christian Watson, Richard Warmisham, Dan Ryder Cook, Gary Adams, Sarah Christensen, Lubica Patekova, James Linard, and Laurent Peacock – who was recently awarded a Guild Mark for his Sika console table.
Ex-robinson house studio student Laurent Peacock has been awarded Bespoke Guild Mark no.465 by the Worshipful Company of Furniture Makers. The Guild Mark was awarded for his Sika console table, inspired by the stance and hide patterns of a young deer.
Theo Cook created this amazing Japanese sunrise dovetail joint which got over 11 million views on Facebook. Click here to find out more about his fantastic dovetails. What’s your role here at robinson house studio? I am vice principal and