Apologies For Late Update

Unfortunately due to an odd "admin" lock up at our web hosts, we have been a little delayed with our August update.

Obviously, if you are reading this, the problem has been resolved and we are now back up to speed. This "lock up" was the reason that our Redbridge Marquetry Group header was missing from each page, and that our visitor counter was missing.

We hope your enjoyment of visiting our site hadn't been too compromised. Thanks for bearing with us while the problem was being resolved.

Revised Tutorials Menu Page

Due to the high levels of tutorial and information pages we are amassing on this site, your editorial team has decided to restructure our "Tutorials Menu" page to make it much easier for you to use.

We have spilt the page up into logical categories that will make your selection so much easier to find. Click the link to find out for yourself >>>  

Norman Clegg's Marquetry Pictures

In the popular television series "Last of the Summer Wine" Norman Clegg has had two marquetry pictures hanging on the walls of his living room for quite a few years now.

We have been intrigued by these pictures, but none of us have been able to identify them. So, one of our group members has made their own version of each, and we are showing them here to see if anyone can recognise them and give us some information about them. Click the link to see if you can identify them >>>

Links Page Information

Some new additions have been added to our links and artistic links pages. We have included a good supplier of exotic veneers and packs of off cuts. Do take a look at their web site to see what we mean. There is also a new addition to our artistic links page that we think you will enjoy. Just click the "Useful Links" button at the bottom of this page to visit the sites.

Staircase House

Roy Murton, (our venerable Chairman) has spent the last several months working on a project for the Royal National Institute for the Blind which was a veneer adorned scale model of Staircase House, Stockport.
This was an intriguing project and we are pleased to say that an article describing it's construction is available on this web site.
Just click the link on the right for this item: 

International Woodworking Exhibition

The 2008 International Woodworking Exhibition was held at Alexandra Palace during February and proved to be very successful.

The Redbridge Group hosted the Marquetry Society stand on the Saturday - and the throughput and interest of marquetry minded visitors was beyond expectations.

To read a report, and see some photos of the exhibition, just click the link on the right >>>

A Couple of "Near Six Footers"

A visitor to this web site recently sent some photos to your editorial team of some marquetry pictures he owns that are near on six feet tall each!

The detail of the work and the veneer selection rather impressed us old codgers in the editorial team - and so, not wishing to deprive you, our visitors, of the chance to get a glimpse of these excellent works, we are including a couple of them here for you to enjoy.

Simply click the link >>>

The Old London Group's Murals

In the 1970's the now defunct London Group (the membership split up to become the Harrow and Redbridge Groups) made a number of very large murals.

Only one of those murals seems to have survived in peoples memory with any clarity, that one being the "Silver Jubilee" mural, but the others have rather faded from the scene over the years.

With the help of that most knowledgeable of marquetarians Alf Murtell, much useful material featuring the murals has now been uncovered and we are pleased to be able to bring it to you on this web site.

We start this small series off with two of those murals, these being the "London Festival" mural, and a contemporary report on the "Silver Jubilee" mural. Click the link to read their fascinating stories >>>

The 2008 Inter-Group Competition

This year's competition was held between the St. Albans and Redbridge Marquetry Groups.

The evening was very enjoyable and even included one of Chairman Roy's famous quizzes! Don't you wish you'd been there?

Anyway, the evening was a great success - and we're pleased to say that we've got an interesting report for you, just click the link >>>

The RMG in May 2008

Due to various commitments with the Marquetry Society web site, and preparing our entries for the national exhibition, we have been somewhat tardy in bringing you up to date information about our group

However, we have taken this opportunity to repair that omission and we have got our resident master photographer Dave Walker to take an impromptu snap shot of life at one of our regular Wednesday meetings in the "merry month" of May.

Click the link on the right to enjoy a recent meeting of the RMG >>>

Tom's Summer General Knowledge Quiz

After the success of his Yuletide and Easter general knowledge quizzes, our resident academician the professorial Tom Brewer has put his learned brain once again to the task of testing our knowledge with 20 more of his tantalising "Tom's Teasers".

The difficulty of those questions he poses us really makes us think that Tom must, most certainly, be eating plenty of fish for his tea!

Click the link on the right to see if you can complete Tom's quiz without looking up the answers beforehand! >>> 

Tom's Summer Holiday 2008 Quiz

And amazingly that most studious of Marquetarians, the infamous Tom Brewer, has applied his great mind to the task and produced yet another of his celebrated quizzes for you to ponder over during the summer's long hot days.

Our Tom really knows his onions, so see if you can match Tom's intellect by answering all twenty questions in one go without clicking on the answers first. >>> 

2008 National Marquetry Exhibition Gallery

The full gallery of every award winning exhibit from the 2008 National Marquetry Exhibition has now been made available on our sister site "The Marquetry Society web site".

Being the generous souls that we are, we are providing you with a link into that web site so that you can have the opportunity to see some of the best that there is in marquetry today.

But, do remember that, once you've finished visiting the gallery - come back here to visit all the good things we've got in this web site! Enjoy your visit >>>

Cartoon from Summer Issue of Marquetarian Magazine

The Summer issue of the Marquetarian magazine featured a cartoon (drawn by a member of the Redbridge Group) that craftily features some members from the Redbridge Group.

Take a look at the cartoon and see if you can identify any of them.

We will tell you who they are in our next update.

Tom's Autumn Quiz

How does he come up with all these quizzes? He must have a brain the size of the Encyclopaedia Britannica mustn't he?

Yes indeed, these are some of the questions posed to us after the success of Tom's earlier quizzes. But our Tom is a very learned fellow and almost "eats reference books for his tea!"

Tom is academically qualified in many subjects and is a very friendly knowledge base for all us at the Redbridge Group. Click the link for Tom's Autumn 2008 quiz >>>

Those Recent Annoying "Web Site Not Available" Messages

Unfortunately there were a few of those "Web site not available" or "error 404" messages appearing at odd times in place of our web site over the last few weeks.

We apologise for that. It transpires that an intermittent error appeared on our server and caused "outages" that lasted from a couple of minutes to around half an hour at completely random times. Such problems are difficult to resolve, simply because, when you go to test the equipment, everything appears to be working correctly until the fault situation occurs. However, our hosts have now set up a monitoring regime in order to resolve the problem - so with any luck we should now have seen the last of those annoying messages.

Thanks for bearing with us while the problem existed, your patronage is much appreciated by us all here at the Redbridge Marquetry Group.

The Answer to the Marquetarian Summer Issue Cartoon

Four items lower down on this page you will find an entry describing the cartoon displayed in the Summer issue of the Marquetarian magazine.

The cartoon featured several members of the Redbridge Group. We asked you to see if you could recognise and name the group members displayed.

To find out if you guessed (or knew) correctly, we are now bringing you the answer to the question, just click the link to see if you got it right >>>

RMG "Mini" Exhibition

October saw our Redbridge Group receive a visit from a prominent dignitary of the Arts Council (RB).

In honour of this prestigious event we staged a mini exhibition of marquetry work for our guest to peruse and enjoy. We are pleased to say that our little exhibition was a complete success and helped to bring the art and craft of marquetry a little further to the fore.

While our guest, our Chairman and other members of the committee were having refreshments, our crafty cameraman got to work with his "Box Brownie" and snapped a few photos of the exhibits. Click the link to see a few of our selected examples >>>  

Tom's Christmas 2008 General Knowledge Quiz

Our very own Mastermind, the Professorial Tom Brewer, is determined to keep your intellect on tip top form, despite all that Christmas cheer and plum duff that you've been scoffing, with another of his General Knowledge Quizzes.

This quiz is Tom's Christmas present to you all, we hope you enjoy solving it.

Just click the link to enjoy Professor Tom's quiz >>>

Tom's "Chilly Start 2009" Quiz

2009 started off rather chilly for us here in Redbridge, UK.

The winter evenings of February do not instil too much cheer, but, fear not, our Professor Tom has devised another of his brain teaser quizzes for us to get our brain's heated with a goodly level of pleasurable overwork.

Click the link on the right for Tom's latest "Chilly Start 2009" Quiz >>>

Tom's "Easter 2009" Quiz

Our Tom doesn't sit on his laurels with just a quiz or two during the year.

He has been at it already and compiled a quiz for the 2009 Easter Holidays. Once again it is one of Tom's very popular general knowledge quizzes; and this one has some esoteric and especially mind challenging questions that will get you puzzling for a goodly while. Have a go and see how you get on with this latest 'teaser'. Best of luck.

Click the link on the right for Tom's latest "Easter 2009" Quiz >>>

Marquetry - from a Newcomer's Point of view

Paul began his marquetry career only fairly recently. His fiancée (who is already a member of the Redbridge Group) had brought him along to one of our Wednesday meetings to see what he thought of our marquetry group.

What Paul saw there inspired him so much that he immediately joined the group as a new member.

You can click the link on the right to read Paul's own story of his venture into making his very first marquetry picture - we think you will find it rather inspiring >>>  

New Responsibilities

Our usual updates have been a little sparse over the last few months, let us explain why this has been:

We had a lot of administrative issues and new duties to perform since the beginning of this year, so we have inevitably been a wee bit "tied up" with settling in to our new positions. This has caused us to focus on other marquetry items over the last few months and, of necessity we have had to place our updates 'on the back burner' for a short while until things were back up to speed. Thanks for bearing with us during this period, we appreciate your patience.

We are now looking forward to our Autumn term bringing us a little more 'free time' so that we can at last divert our attentions more fully towards the refurbishment of this web site.

Tom's "Summer 2009" Quiz

We are back with our latest update, and to celebrate the event our Prof Tom has compiled another of his famous quizzes for you to puzzle over.

As you will have guessed, Tom is an avid crossword fan, and you can guarantee he will easily complete the 'Times' crossword before the rest of us have even finished answering the second clue. We all somehow seem to know we can always rely on Tom to provide an answer to a previous sticky question when we see him at a Wednesday group meeting - and don't we all just take advantage of that situation! How we ever get any marquetry done with such diversions as these amazes us.

Click the link on the right to have a go at Tom's latest "Summer 2009" Quiz >>>

2009 National Marquetry Exhibition Gallery

Our companion web site "marquetry.org" now has the 2009 National Exhibition Gallery available for you to visit and enjoy.

Click the link on the right to visit this gallery and see some of the very best marquetry available today. Do look out for the Redbridge entries while you tour around the gallery.

Bt the way, don't forget to return back here when you have finished your visit!

Vicky and Paul

While we were off for our summer break, two members of the Redbridge Marquetry Group celebrated their love for each other by returning for our autumn term as husband and wife!

Our Vicky and Paul are now Mr & Mrs Savvas.
Congratulations to them from us all at the Redbridge Marquetry Group.

Just click the link on the right to see a few selected moments from their most joyful and happiest of days >>>.

Click the link on the right to visit the stated page >>

Click the link on the right to visit the stated page >>

Click the link on the right to visit the stated page >>

Click the link on the right to visit the stated page >>

Veneer Reference Library

Another page of veneers and their descriptions have been added to our veneer reference library. This latest batch of descriptions now takes us up to page 13 (or 12a for the superstitious!) so, if you would like a quick peep at these new descriptions,
Just click the link on the right for this item: 

January
2008
until
December
2008

Our Winter to Spring Term 2008

On Wednesday 9th January 2008 the Redbridge Marquetry Group returned to their rooms for the winter to spring term.
We will not be taking another break until Easter, so if you are in our area on a Wednesday evening, please do drop in and say hello - we would love to meet you. 
 

 IMPORTANT INFO - OUR 2008 EASTER HOLIDAY

The Redbridge Group start their Easter holidays after their last meeting for the winter term on the 9th April 2008 and are then back in their rooms on the 23rd April 2008 until they take their summer break later in the year.
We will keep you posted of the dates when we do our April 2008 update.

Yuletide General Knowledge Quiz

The R M G's very own "fount of all knowledge" Tom Brewer has, for once, been persuaded to put down his scapel and veneers for a few minutes and set his great mind to a completely different task.

Your editorial team has, as of one collective voice, requested Tom to make this a special festive season by compiling one of his legendary quizzes especially for our web site.

Tom, being the gentleman that he is, has kindly obliged us with a real corker of a quiz.

To enjoy this quiz for yourself, just click the link on the right, watch some of those questions though, as the answers are not always what you would first think >>  

Tom's Easter General Knowledge Quiz

After the success of his Yuletide general knowledge quiz, our resident academician the professorial Tom Brewer has put his learned brain once again to the task of testing our knowledge with 20 more of his tantalising "Tom's Teasers".

The difficulty of those questions he poses us really makes us think that Tom must, most certainly, be eating plenty of fish for his tea!

Click the link on the right to see if you can complete Tom's quiz without looking up the answers beforehand! >>> 

The 2007 National Exhibition Gallery 

After all the waiting - here is the 2007 National Exhibition Gallery in all its splendour.

Although it is located on the Marquetry Society web site, we are happy to be including a link that will take you directly to Display Page 1 of the Gallery.

Display Page 1 opens up the Beginner's Gallery where the galleries proceed consecutively up to class 10a and then on to the "Selected Entries" Gallery. The "Selected Entries" consist of nearly three dozen exhibits that just narrowly missed gaining an award this year.

Every entry in the exhibition was easily capable of winning an award but, as there is only a finite amount of awards available to be given, there has of obvious necessity to be a limited amount of winners.

We are pleased to say however, that a little later on this year, all the remaining exhibition entries will be added to the gallery for you to appreciate and enjoy.

Don't forget to return here when you have finished visiting the 2007 Gallery by clicking our link on the "Links Page". Enjoy your visit. 

The 2007 National Exhibition RMG Entries

We are pleased to be able to bring you all 28 of our Redbridge Group entries from the 2007 National Exhibition.

The exhibits are arranged in 3 display pages (you have already seen the 4 winners from the link in the box below) and by clicking the link on the right, you will enter page 2 of the gallery where you will find 10 of our exhibits plus links to the other display pages.

Redbridge Group Winners

Redbridge Group enjoyed a respectable level of success in this year's National Exhibition competitive classes.

We had four winners, including a first in Class 2.

We have "snaffled" copies of the photos from the Marquetry Society gallery and we are including them here for you as a sort of "sneak preview". We hope you enjoy them. Just click the link on the right >>

2008 Easter Holiday

Apologies for the previous error with our Easter holiday dates. Although the Easter dates were correct, it appears that the educational authority who controls holiday allocation periods for our premises deferred the Easter holiday by 2 weeks this year to balance out the term times more conveniently. 

The Redbridge Marquetry Group will be taking its Easter holiday break directly after its last meeting for this term on Wednesday 9th April 2008.

We will be returning to our rooms to start our Spring/Summer term on Wednesday 23rd April 2008.

Although the group will be away from their rooms during that 2 week period, our web site will still be keeping you up to date with all the information concerning the RMG and its membership. Just keep visiting this site for the latest RMG news and chat.

2007 National Marquetry Exhibition

The 2007 National Exhibition was a wonderful success. We had so many visitors turn up to the exhibition that we ran out of our initial quota of catalogues by the end of the second day and had to have two more batches printed before the exhibition drew to its close.

We offer a big gratitude of thanks to our printer for burning the midnight oil for us on those two occasions and for responding to our requests at such short notice. We are pleased to say that everyone who wanted a catalogue was happily supplied with a catalogue.

Thanks must also go to all our sponsors for their help in making the 2007 National Exhibition such a great success.

Click the report on the right for a short photographic record of the event:

Veneer Descriptions & Library

And yet another new page of veneer descriptions and "scanned" examples of those very veneers have been added to our web site's veneer library with this update.
There are several examples of Burr (or Burl) veneers in this selection.
Burr veneers are rightly prized for their distinctly attractive appearance.
These veneers have a very unique place in marquetry.
Click the link on the right to visit the veneer's pages:

Tunbridge Ware Exhibition

There is now a very interesting article available for you to read concerning the highly successful Tunbridge Ware exhibition recently held at historic Hever Castle.
Click the link on the right to read this article:

Hever Castle is located just off the B2026 at Hever, Edenbridge, Kent.
You can find more information by visiting their web site,
just click the link on the right to enter the web site:

&

"Hever Castle"

2006 National Marquetry Exhibition

The 2006 National Marquetry Exhibition gallery has now been published and is currently available on the Marquetry Society web site.
Being the (ahem!) magnanimous people that we are, we have decided to provide you with a link directly into that gallery so that you don't have to go changing web sites to get there - by the way, don't forget to return to us when you've finished visiting the gallery.
Just click the link on the right for this item:

Please note that this link will
now display the current
National Exhibition
Gallery only.

Marquetry Society Web Site

As many of you know, we at the Redbridge Marquetry Group have taken responsibility for, and are now producing, the Marquetry Society web site.
Since 10th June 2006 that web site has been operating from its new server and is fully operational and, we are happy to say, it no longer suffers from those "bandwidth Limit exceeded" messages that previously plagued it for the last week of every month.
It is available from those two addresses displayed on the right, (you can use either one, they both display the same content):

Other Works by our Members

Another new attraction we are adding to this web site (for a trial period) is a Gallery page displaying the alternate works of our Redbridge Group members.
These 'alternate works' comprise of things such as paintings and drawings which could be used as the basis (or themes) for a marquetry picture.
We think they make an attractive addition to our web site. If you would like to have a shortcut to the Gallery page displaying the 'alternate works'
Just click the link on the right for this item: 

2006 Woodworker Show

In February 2006 the Redbridge Marquetry Group manned the Marquetry Society stand at the Woodworking Show, Alexandra Palace.
The show was a great success and signed up many new members to the Marquetry Society.
Our Dave Walker was one of the RMG members who demonstrated marquetry techniques at the show - and he has compiled a superb report on the show for our web site.
To read Dave's report (and to view the photos)
Just click the link on the right for this item: 

Yes indeed, it is that most revered of 'finishes' Furniglas Home French Polish.

Judging by the way that Furniglas Polish is talked about in such hushed and reverential tones by you erstwhile members of the marquetry fraternity we have to say that it really does seem to be an awful shame that it is not available any longer these days.
 
We would certainly have liked to have tried it and compared the finished result against today's high tech polishes. From what these "matured" Marquetarians keep telling us comparative beginners, it would appear to be that the Furniglas finish was the ultimate standard for all Marquetarians to aspire to.

It must be admitted however, that we have recently seen a picture that was finished with Furniglas well over 30 years ago - and it's finish is still perfect, so it must have been a good product after all because time itself has actually proved it's case for it!.  

The New Marquetry Society web site's front page.