Profiles Feature: John Eadon. Based in Warwickshire, John designs and makes sustainable wood furniture. He fuses traditional techniques with modern practices to create interesting and adaptable shelving. TRELLIS, is a freestanding shelving system which can be used as a room divider and MIMA is his wall hung modular shelving. He also makes wonderful table lamps, side tables, record tables, plant stands and candle holders. Join me as I catch up with John Eadon …
Wood Furniture Collection
Meet John Eadon
John officially launched his furniture business at the London Design Fair in 2017. He runs the company by himself which keeps him extremely busy. John says, “I wear many hats as a small business owner, I have to be a designer, maker, publicist, markettier, salesperson and an accountant!”
Meet John Eadon
Before John found his furniture calling, he lived on a farm with his family in Warwickshire. He packed himself off to Art School to pursue his creative interests and didn’t return for a number of years. John tells me more, “I studied Fine Art Painting and Sculpture at Norwich School of Art & Design (now Norwich University of the Arts) and graduated in 2008. I stayed in Norwich and co-founded a not-for-profit co-operative artist studios, workshops and gallery called Stew (now disbanded). I was working as a gallery and artist technician and also set up the wood workshop at Stew. From here I was able to teach myself better woodworking skills and furniture making. With more experience I began set building, bespoke shop fitting, restoration work for English Heritage and even a bit of boat building.”
TRELLIS Room Divider
He returned to the farm in 2013 with his young family, he elaborates, “after living on a houseboat on the Norfolk Broads I went back to the farm. I set up a workshop in an outbuilding and renovated part of the farmhouse to live in. I continued to work as a carpenter and bespoke furniture maker before deciding to work towards launching as a company creating my own designs after years of working to clients’ strict briefs. With money saved from previous projects, and the set-up of my workshop, I was ready to start my own venture.”
View The John Eadon Collection
John designs and makes contemporary furniture for trade and consumers with a Scandi aesthetic and a nod towards mid-century modern. He says “I manufacture my own designs, collaborate with others and produce bespoke commissions. I mainly use British and European hardwoods which are sustainably sourced from well managed forests to create my furniture. I blend craft and traditional techniques with modern technology and manufacturing methods, so you could say that my work is crafted design. I find it vital to develop designs initially with hand drawn sketches as well as modelling and prototyping in real space in the workshop. This enables a much better sense of the form and its relationship to a person as well as ironing out joinery details and strength or functionality issues which may otherwise not surface when only in the virtual world.”
MIMA Collection
The current MIMA Collection is inspired by the techniques of Windsor Chair making. John explains “Windsor Chairs have such a distinctive look with their spindles, it’s an example of where the structure and form are largely determined by the way the object is made and put together. So, I took these design principals and applied them as a kind of limited palette to design and make other pieces of furniture, although I do have some chair designs in the pipeline but perhaps for next year.”
MIMA Collection
The MIMA Collection includes the MIMA Shelving which is a modular wall hung shelving system, and the TRELLIS Shelving which is a freestanding shelving system. John says, “these are both based on the same principals, again inspired by Windsor chair techniques, and use ladder style brackets with moveable shelves. The MIMA Shelving has various bracket and shelf sizes meaning not only can you buy a shelving set but that you can use various components to create a customised layout.”
MIMA Shelving
The TRELLIS Shelving System as John explains, “can also be used as a room divider and has an arched top and bottom parts which connect the ladder brackets. Moveable panels and shelves allow for almost endless layout possibilities and offers an opportunity to have contemporary furniture design with the warmth of wood and a handcrafted touch.”
TRELLIS Shelving System
John tells me that his creative inspiration comes from so many things which can strike when he is at his workbench playing with materials or wandering around a design exhibition. Woodwork and carving runs in the family from his gran and her father. His Art Teacher at secondary school was a huge factor in helping him on his creative quest. John has learnt a lot from the cabinetmaking of the Arts and Crafts Movement as well as James Krenov and the Greenwood working of Mike Abbott. He admires the work of Hans Wegner and contemporary designers such as Tom Raffield who has taken the ancient art of steam bending wood to create furniture and Sebastian Cox for innovation and sustainability.
Buy John Eadon Products
For more information go to the John Eadon Website. You can buy products shown on the website which can be altered or finished to your liking. Or you can commission a bespoke piece which could be anything from a jewellery box to a bespoke kitchen. Items can be shipped overseas. A single MIMA Shelf bracket which can be used as a plant hanger is from £40, a 3 shelf set of MIMA Shelving from £390, a side table from £660 and the TRELLIS Shelving System starts from £1910 for a single unit. The TRELLIS Shelving is also available from Heal’s on Tottenham court road in London.
Author: Homegirl London. Photographs: John Eadon.
