Expert Woodcarving & Restoration - Paul Ferguson: Emotion in Art

Woodcarving, Gilding and Conservation

Displayed are several projects illustrating the diversity of commissions

undertaken over the past decades

Two Alms Plates turned in Oak, commissioned by the Worshipful Company of Butchers

and presented to St Bartholomew's Church in 1979

and a breadboard commissioned by the Worshipful Company of Bakers turned in various woods

presented to Alderman Nicholas Lyons on his installation as Lord Mayor in 2022.

Two commissions for Alexander McQueen, a mannequin and a pair of prosthetic legs made especially for paralympic athlete Aimee Mullins who wore them to open his fashion show in 1999. Both were exhibited in his retrospective 'Savage Beauty' at the Metropolitan Museum of Art NY, 2011 and the V&A London, 2015. They also featured in the Grinling Gibbons 300 celebration at Bonhams, London, and Compton Verney, Warwickshire, 2021.

The Windsor Castle Fire Restoration: these are known as the Carlton House Trophies, they were installed in the castle when Carlton House was demolished, 1828. They are a set that are applied to door panels in the Drawing Rooms of the State Apartments, these in the Crimson Drawing Room. There are 38 panels in total of which these are six. The outer photographs are full size with the fragments that were saved overlayed. The central photograph is the finished restoration before installation at Windsor. During the works Princess Margaret visited the workshop. At the time I was carving the upper left panel. There was just one small leaf rescued which is circled. She insisted that I should sign the panel. This was contrary to the instructions, no works were to be signed. However, I was instructed to write a letter outlining her wishes which was forwarded to the controlling committees. Consequently I was directed to sign the panel. Possibly the only signature to be officially made in the whole restoration. This is the pinnacle of my career...so far.

This commission was to design an epergne and make lime wood patterns to be caste in silver

for the silversmiths employed by Garrards the jewellers to produce the finished piece.

This is a sequence of photographs showing the stages of carving a Louis XV centre/corner picture frame

Three rocking creatures, an elephant, a dragon and a dolphin.

Carved in oak and painted, gilded and incorporating silver gilt mounts.

Produced to concept sketches by designers at Asprey of London.

The Banbury Town Hall Clock Tower, designed by Edward Bruton and completed in 1854,

underwent restoration due to severe weathering and loss of original oak details

. The wooden section was carefully dismantled, each element numbered, and reconstructed in the workshop.

Damaged and missing sections were repaired or replaced, and the tower

was subsequently reassembled and fully restored.

Osterley Park House, West London,1993/4. The conservation and repair of the four pineapple finials mounted on the corner towers. Three of the pineapples were patched and consolidated the third had to be replaced.